2010928,Joke, contributed by Juhye Lyu

A brain goes to a local bar A brain walks into a bar and says, "I'll have a pint of beer please." The barman looks at him and says "Sorry, I can't serve you." "Why not?" askes the brain. "You're already out of your head."

2010928,Word, contributed by kyunjin Lee

"cadre"

 

cadre is a small group of people who have been specially chosen, trained, and organized for a particular purpose.

 

The arrangement of parts that gives something its basic form.

Assignment Topic "the Bull in a China Shop" by Jihwan Kim

The way that we talk!  "Detour" or "Straight"  

 

My experience shows that Korean (also Japan) is likely to speak indirectly but

 

American wants to speak directly. So I want to talk about this issue based on my own experience.

 

 

News Article, 20100928, contributed by Lyu Juhye

Arrest in Disputed Seas Riles China and Japan By MARTIN FACKLER and IAN JOHNSON Published: September 19, 2010 RECOMMEND TWITTER SIGN IN TO E-MAIL PRINT REPRINTS SHARE TOKYO — What started nearly two weeks ago with the Japanese Coast Guard's arrest of a Chinese trawler captain in disputed waters has snowballed into a heated diplomatic standoff between China andJapan, highlighting anxieties in Asia about China's rising power and assertiveness. Enlarge This Image Reuters Japanese Coast Guard officers arrested Zhan Qixiong, a Chinese fishing trawler captain, on Sept. 8 in disputed waters. Enlarge This Image Jason Lee/Reuters A protester, bearing a Chinese flag tattoo, near the Japanese Embassy in Beijing on Saturday. The standoff over the arrest, which took place in waters near uninhabited islands claimed by both countries, escalated Sunday as China announced that it had suspended high-level exchanges with Japan, and threatened additional "strong countermeasures," after Tokyo said it would extend its detention of the captain. The captain, Zhan Qixiong, 41, was arrested on Sept. 8 after his fishing boat collided with two Japanese Coast Guard vessels near the islands. The arrest, for obstructing officers on duty, quickly grew from a seemingly minor incident into a h ighly emotional issue in both countries, where it has become a top news item and has begun to spill over into other aspects of the two nations' extensive economic and political ties. Since the arrest, there have been mass cancellations of trips to Japan by Chinese tourists and protests in front of Japanese diplomatic missions and schools in China, as well as tensions over the possibility of drilling for natural gas in contested waters in the East China Sea. In a statement on Sunday, China's Foreign Ministry said Japan had "seriously damaged Sino-Japan bilateral relations." Beijing suspended all relations between provincial and central government officials and their Japanese counterparts, including talks aimed at expanding aviation routes and cooperation on coal. "We demand the Japanese side immediately release the Chinese captain unconditionally," said a Foreign Ministry spokesman, Ma Zhaoxu. "If the Japanese side clings obstinately to its course, making mistake upon mistake, then China will take strong countermeasures and Japan will bear all the consequences." The situation has also become a test of wills between Japan, the region's established power and now-fading economic giant, and China, a rising force that feels its time has come to take what it regards as its rightful place in Asia. For Japan, the episode has fanned growing fears here that an increasingly powerful China will become ever more insistent in pressing territorial claims against its neighbors, and in trying to assert military control of ever-wider swaths of the waters around China. This anxiety has been one reason that Japan's year-old Democratic Party government, now under the newly re-elected prime minister Naoto Kan, toned down its calls for an East Asian community, and instead has sought to strengthen ties with Washington, its longtime protector. Concern that Chinese pressure on Japan's borders will only grow has led to uncharacteristically strident calls in normally passive Japan to stand up to China's demands. Japanese news media have warned of a broader pattern of China's pushing its territorial claims, including recent disputes with Southeast Asian countries over the South China Sea. "If China thinks that by taking a strong stance that Japan will just roll over, then it is mistaken," said an editorial in the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper, Japan's largest daily. For its part, China tends to see Japan as a proxy for the United States, whose cold-war-era alliances with Japan and other countries in the region now seem aimed at holding it back. Beijing wants to appear firm in defending its territorial claims, which Chinese people overwhelmingly believe are legitimate. The angry emotions in China also reflect a thinly veiled animosity toward Japan that is rooted in Japan's brutal military occupation during World War II. China's anti-Japan sentiment from the war has surfaced repeatedly despite the deep economic relations that have developed between the two countries. Revisions to Japanese textbooks that played down or ignored Japan's wartime atrocities in China and other colonized Asian countries have always been a sore point. Relations were aggravated, too, by repeated visits to a Japanese war shrine by Junichiro Koizumi, a former prime minister, during his 2001-6 term. Indeed, the current dispute seems to have sent tensions to their highest point since Mr. Koizumi left office. It involves several uninhabited islands — known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China — in the East China Sea off Taiwan. Activists in many Chinese-speaking regions, including Hong Kong and Taiwan, have challenged Japan's claims to the islands, making it a test for Beijing and Tokyo. The competing claims have been a source of tension before, most recently five years ago, when anti-Japanese protests erupted in some Chinese cities. However, in a possible sign of the region's shifting power balance, China's demands seem a bit stronger, and Japan's response a bit more defensive. Since the arrest, the Chinese government has summoned the Japanese ambassador six times to protest, including one time in the early morning that was interpreted in Tokyo as a diplomatic slap in the face. The most recent call came on Sunday, when the Foreign Ministry summoned the ambassador to make "solemn representations" to him about the detention of the captain, China's state-run Xinhua news agency said. In addition, Chinese companies have canceled tours to Japan by 10,000 tourists. Japan has complained about signs that China could begin drilling for natural gas in another contested area of the East China Sea, which would violate an agreement between the two nations to develop the area jointly. "If we can find proof, our country will take appropriate measures," said Japan's foreign minister, Seiji Maehara. Besides the captain, the Japanese Coast Guard detained the crew members, though they were later released along with their boat. On Sunday, a Japanese court approved a request by prosecutors to extend the captain's pretrial detention for 10 days. China has repeatedly called for the captain's release, all the while trying to play down nationalist sentiment at home. On Saturday, groups of Chinese commemorated the 79th anniversary of Japan's invasion of northeast China with small protests in front of Japanese diplomatic missions. Mr. Maehara said Friday that it was appropriate for the trawler captain's case to be handled in Japanese courts because the disputed islands are an "integral part of Japanese territory" "Territorial issues do not exist in this region," he said. Chinese analysts said that China's leaders have concluded that Japan is trying to set an example. "Japan is trying to get China to eat the bitter fruit" of its sovereignty over the islands, said Wang Xiangsui, director of the Center for Security Strategy at the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics. "They want China to accept the fact that they control the islands." Martin Fackler reported from Tokyo, and Ian Johnson from Beijing. A version of this article appeared in print on September 20, 2010, on page A1 of the New York edition.

Assignment Topic 20100926 contributed by kyung jin Lee

 

<"Negative question">

 

My topic began with negative questions in English.

It is clear that the way of negative question in Korean is different from English when we answer. Grammatically, this is the most confusing part in Korean. So a lot of Korean often misunderstand the intention of native speakers of English.

This is a story when I was in Canada. At that time, one of my friends was homestaying with Canadian who was from South America. I've met her, she was nice and she likes to take care of others. One day, they had big dinner. As soon as my friend ate up all his dish, the homestay mother suggested to eat more to him by using a negative question. He already felt full and he couldn't eat anymore. However, he answered reversely due to a confusing negative question.

Although he couldn't eat more, he had to eat more. Because it was her favor so he couldn't refuse. In Korean custom, it is important to accept other's favor even if he or she is not good condition. Of course he could decline her favor by correcting his opinion but he didn't do that.

Article, 20100928, contibuted by kyung jin, Lee

·        EUROPE NEWS

·        SEPTEMBER 23, 2010, 9:16 P.M. ET

Pension Protests Sweep France

 

By NATHALIE BOSCHAT (The Wall Street Journal)

PARIS—French unions staged a major showdown with the government Thursday, with demonstrations and strikes taking place across the country to protest a pension overhaul that will raise the retirement age to 62 years old from the current 60.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy recently described pension changes as one of the most important issues for France. He has staked his government's financial credibility on it as France has embarked on a cost-cutting drive aimed at bringing its public deficit from a projected 8% of gross domestic product this year to 3% in 2013—the maximum allowed under euro-zone treaties.

Despite significant disruptions in the transport system, particularly in train and air travel, the action was showing some signs of fatigue around midday with fewer workers on strike than at a previous demonstration against the pension revamp on Sept. 7.

Around 20% of civil servants working for the French central administration were on strike around midday, compared with nearly 25% at the earlier protests, according to the French Civil Service Ministry. That rate reached 23.6% for civil servants working in the public-education system, fewer than the 27% of strikers at the beginning of September. The Interior Ministry had counted just under 410,000 demonstrators at 110 rallies across the country, compared with 450,000 people at 114 rallies on Sept 7.

The eight unions driving the action were hoping to muster more people on the streets than during the previous demonstrations, when between 1.1 million and 2.7 million people took to the streets, according to rival estimates produced by the Interior Ministry and unions.

The unions are united in demanding the retirement age be kept at 60, and hope to weigh in on debate over the bill, which starts in the Senate on Oct. 5, amid record-low popularity ratings for Mr. Sarkozy's right-wing government. The bill was adopted last week by the National Assembly.

As protest marches started in Paris around lunchtime, Bernard Thibault, leader of the communist-leaning union Confédération Générale du Travail, or CGT, described the action as having "roughly the same scope" as the previous one, adding the government risks facing a new phase of conflict if it doesn't budge on the pension overhaul.

So far, the government has remained intractable on a move it has said will save €20 billion ($26.79 billion) by 2020 and will balance the books of the pension system by 2018.

Labor Minister Éric Woerth said Monday the financial equilibrium of the reform rests on raising the basic retirement age to 62 and the age for full entitlements to 67. But he said he was open to some concessions for disabled workers and unemployed people who are close to retirement, and that he would work towards closing the salary gap between men and women.

Thursday's strikes caused significant transport disruptions, with only half of high-speed and regional trains running, and certain provincial networks operating only one-quarter of normal services, according to state-owned rail operator SNCF.

Workers commuting to Paris from the suburbs faced major difficulties with only one in three suburban trains circulating on some lines, but services on the Paris Métro were smoother and close to normal levels on most lines, according to the RATP subway operator.

Flag airline Air France-KLM said it was canceling half of its short- and medium-haul flights out of Paris but maintaining all its long-distance flights. French oil major Total SA said 50% to 80% of its French refineries' employees had joined the nationwide strike but that there was "no significant impact" on output.

The eight unions plan to meet on Friday to decide whether and how to continue their protest campaign.

 

Poll Shows Boxer Out Front in California; Governor’s Race Is Tight (By Jihwan Kim)

September 25, 2010, 7:58 pm

Poll Shows Boxer Out Front in California; Governor's Race Is Tight

By ADAM NAGOURNEY

LOS ANGELES — Senator Barbara Boxer, a Democrat, has built a comfortable lead over her Republican opponent, Carly Fiorina, in a Senate race that could prove central to Republican hopes of capturing the Senate this November, according to a poll published by the Los Angeles Times on Saturday. The poll showed that Ms. Boxer was supported by 51 percent of likely voters, compared with 43 percent support for Ms. Fiorina.

 

The poll, conducted for the Los Angeles Times and the University of Southern California, found the race for governor essentially deadlocked. Jerry Brown, the attorney general and a Democrat, has 49 percent support among likely voters, compared with 44 percent for Meg Whitman, his Republican challenger. That difference is within the poll's margin of sampling error, plus or minus 3.3 percentage points.

 

The poll is the latest that suggests that Ms. Whitman is having trouble winning the support of Californians, despite the fact that she has invested $119 million of her own money into the race, shattering a record set by Michael R. Bloomberg when he ran for mayor of New York. Meanwhile, Mr. Brown has run a campaign that has been criticized even by some Democrats as being low-energy and underfinanced.

 

The poll was conducted as Ms. Boxer was airing a hard-hitting advertisement showing Ms. Fiorina talking about laying off 30,000 workers when she was head of Hewlett-Packard. There has also been increased attention on some of Ms. Fiorina's more conservative positions, including her opposition to abortion rights and her support of a state proposition here that would suspend indefinitely the landmark greenhouse gas bill passed here in 2006.

 

 

Quote assigned for 28th of Sep. Park Jiyoung

Common sense is judgment without reflection, shared by an entire class, an entire nation, or the entire human race. 
Giambattista Vico

Article assigned for 28th Sep. Park Jiyoung

North Korean elite secretly jostle for the reins of power

Kim Jong-il has chosen his son to succeed him, but other figures may set the state's course

Guardian.co.uk

Peter Beaumont and Michael Rank in Rason, North Korea The Observer, Sunday 26 September 2010

The poster for the first conference of the (North) Korean Workers' party to be held since 1966 depicts four striving, heroic figures. A rifle-bearing soldier leads the way, but only by the tiniest of margins, followed by an engineer in a hard hat. Behind them stride a technocrat clutching a rolled-up blueprint and a female farmer with a sheaf of wheat.

Taken together they represent a vision of proletarian certainty and confidence. But the reality in the world's most notoriously unpredictable state is wholly different. This week, hidden from the world, its future will be mapped out behind closed doors, with international implications. The country's leadership cadres will meet at a historic gathering in the vast 25 April Culture Hall in Pyongyang, where delegates will engage in a "revolutionary surge", rubber-stamping the emergence of a new politburo and the policies it will enact.

The third party conference, due to begin on Tuesday, is expected to mark the beginning of the handover from an ailing Kim Jong-il, 68, who suffered a stroke two years ago, to his son Kim Jong-un, 27.

"This is big stuff," said a western diplomat with wide experience of the workings of Pyongyang's elite. "This is the first Workers' party meeting on this scale in over 30 years. Maybe power can be handed over successfully, but it is a very risky time. This kind of forum is a catalyst. It is where you would see the old guard perhaps replaced with younger blood. The stakes are high."

The last such meeting of the party was the 1980 congress – a shorter event than this week's conference – at which Kim Jong-il, then 38, made his political debut with an appearance that confirmed he was in line to succeed his father, Kim Il-sung, the founder of modern North Korea. Delayed once this month – either because of damage to roads by recent flooding or because of disagreements over who should lead it – the congress will be held at a critical moment. Buffeted by economic and food crises and a pariah once again after its alleged sinking of a South Korean warship, the country is also under intense pressure from its closest ally, China, which is fearful of a complete North Korean collapse, to both introduce market reforms and make itself more accessible to the world.

It is not clear how many North Koreans have seen posters for the conference, released officially in July, or heeded their call to welcome it as an "auspicious event". In the muddy, impoverished northern city of Rason, earlier this month, no posters were visible.

Some South Korean analysts believe any decisions may be kept secret because the party's elite fear that giving too much away about life after Kim Jong-il could turn him into a lame duck and destabilise the country. And while much has been made of the formal confirmation of Kim Jong-un as successor to the family business of dictatorship, close observers of the country are far more intrigued by other manoeuvrings around Kim Jong-un's anticipated promotion.

Other senior figures have been reinforcing their positions. The most prominent is Chang Sung-taek, Kim Jong-il's powerful brother-in-law, whose faction appears to have been pushing aggressively to the fore in recent months. And while observers have predicted the danger of collapse in North Korea before – not least during the 1990s – they believe the country may be entering a period of increasing instability.

"Succession is always the Achilles' heel of regimes like this," said Aidan Foster-Carter, a North Korea expert at Leeds University, who has noted the flurry of changes at the top of the regime in the past year. "I'm sure this is a significant moment." He is one of a number of analysts who believe that Chang Sung-taek is being lined up to play a pivotal role in the succession, either as "regent", as facilitator of the succession period, or even as a leader should Kim Jong-un prove unpalatable in the long run.

As Andrei Lankov, an academic at Kookmin University in the South Korean capital of Seoul, argued in the Wall Street Journal, the very weakness of the untested and unfamiliar Kim Jong-un makes him extremely attractive to other members of the regime.

Tall, slender and intelligent, credited with being "cosmopolitan" and charismatic in the closed world of Pyongyang's senior political cadres, Chang Sung-taek has also been tipped by watchers for promotion this week at the party congress – perhaps to the position of party secretary. He is married to Kim Jong-il's sister, and his brother was a military commander in charge of the defence of Pyongyang. He retains close links to the military.

Purged briefly in 2004 and sent into internal exile for two years – possibly because of his growing power – Chang was reinstated in 2006. Significantly, he took over the reins of power when Kim Jong-il had a stroke in 2008. After his rehabilitation, Chang was described by Choi Jin-wook of the Korea Institute for National Unification in Seoul as having fewer enemies than other senior cadres "because when he purges people, they are not just sent away from Pyongyang, they are killed".

One of Chang's closest allies, the former premier Pak Pong-ju, regarded as a pragmatist by the South, and who attempted to introduce market reforms into North Korea's basket-case economy, has been promoted to a key industrial role. It has, perhaps, been his restoration that has been the most intriguing development, following the disastrous devaluation of the country's currency, suggesting that North Korea may once again be interested in market reforms.

Assignment Topic 20100922 by Rho Inseon

( A bull in a China shop)
 
 

Being an Asian Bull in Canada
 
 

"A minor mistake in a restaurant in Canada"

Article 20100928 contributed by Rho Inseon

 

Illegal Gangnam tutor made 150 million won a month

2010-09-19 17:47

· Voiceware

Despite efforts by education offices to cut down on illegal private lessons and reinforce public education, students and parents seem largely reliant on private tutoring, often at extravagant prices.

The Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education and police recently caught an illicit undercover private tutoring class after a seven-month-long probe. A private tutor was arrested for giving expensive illegal lessons at his apartment in Gangnam, a southern Seoul district notorious for its overheated educational competition.

Although this was the first case in years that education officials clamped down on, illegal tutoring is thought to be still rampant in the affluent and education-fevered Gangnam and Mok-dong areas.

The arrested tutor earned up to 150 million won ($129,000) per month, officials said, adding he took an average annual tutoring fee of 10 million won from each student.

"We suspect his income far exceeded his claims, considering the fact that he rented expensive apartments in Gangnam, which would cost up to 5 to 7 million won per month," said an official of the Seoul education office.

The office requested the Seoul Regional Tax Service to conduct an extensive tax investigation into the arrested tutor.

It plans to step up efforts to curb illegal classes in Seoul.

Observers, however, doubt that the present system will be effective in cracking down on the covert lessons which take place in residential areas.

Though the education office introduced last July a financial reward system for those who report illegal education institutes and private lessons, the size of the private education market has not budged much over the past year.

The number of newly registered private tutors rose by 168 percent during the period with most of them being moderately priced.

"The exorbitant private lessons held in apartments are almost impossible to crack down on unless we have material evidence to prove the illegality of the contents," said an education official.

"Not only are the teachers alert against raids, but also students are taught to be discreet when attending such classes, making it all the more difficult for officials to step in."

This is why it took seven months for officials to get their hands on the even Gangnam private tutor, though the first report was made back in February, said officials.

The number of private education institutes reached 47,459 as of the end of 2008, a 30 percent increase from 2006, according to the National Tax Service.

Their total registered turnover also rose to 5.4 trillion won ($4.6 billion) from 4.1 trillion won over the period.

The flourishing private education market nevertheless does not seem to be contributing much to pulling up the general education level.

Among the 16 metropolitan cities and provinces, Seoul last year topped the list in the number of academically underachieving high school students, though it recorded the highest education costs, according to a study by Rep. Hwang Woo-yea of the ruling Grand National Party.

"Seoul, amid its heated private education rush, is largely neglecting a large number of students, especially those who need extra attention and academic guidance," said the lawmaker.

"The city needs to focus more on providing educational equity to all students."

By Bae Hyun-jung (tellme@heraldm.com)

My Own "A Bull in a China Shop" Experience by Park Jiyoung (Outline)

In case Microsoft Word won't open, i attach the contents below:



<English, John Bak Halberg, 2nd semester, 2010>

Park, Ji-young
Department of EU Studies
Graduate School of International and Area Studies





Being an Asian Bull in Europe






Story Outline: this is a story about my own experience, what happened back in 2003 while I was backpacking through different cities in mid-western Europe. I wasn't really a bull, but in hindsight, I could have appeared just as careless and obnoxious as one. I was funding my trip selling my calligraphy works on the street. It was a lot of fun, but doing that, I ran into some unexpected situations; half of them to do with cultural difference, and the other half from my plain stupidity. Through this paper, I'd like to introduce a couple of episodes related to the cultural difference aspects.

Assignment Topic 20100920 for Lyu Juhye

1st Assignment "Bull in a China Shop" Topic: Miscommunication when I made an appointment with my friend.

저의 넷로그 프로필을 구경하세요

	이경진 여성 - 27세 서울특별시				반가워요! I have created a Netlog profile with my pictures, videos, blog and events and I want to add you as a friend so you can see it.   한번 둘러 보세요   You can create your own profile too. 반갑습니다, 이경진
					위에 버튼이 잘 표시되지 않나요? 이 링크를 클릭 하시거나 웹 주소를 복사하여 주소 창에 붙여넣어 주세요. http://ko.netlog.com/go/mailurl/-bT0xMTg1MTAxMiZsPTQmZ209MTImdT0lMkZnbyUyRnJlZ2lzdGVyJTJGaWQlM0QyODIyMDU0MiUyNmklM0RoOTU_ 친구 신청 이메일 수신을 거부 하시겠습니까? 이곳을 클릭 하세요 . Don't want to receive invitations from your friends anymore? Click here . Netlog NV/SA - E. Braunplein 18. B-9000 Gent. Belgium. BE0859635972 - abuse-ko@netlog.com

Joke of the day 20100914 contributed by kyung jin Lee

Four catholic men and a catholic woman were having coffee.

 

The first catholic man tells his friends, "My son is a priest. When he walks into a room, everyone calls him 'Father',"

 

The Second catholic man chirps, "My son is a Bishop. When he walks into a room people call him 'Your Grace'."

 

The Third catholic man says, "My son is a Cardianl. When he enters a room everyone says 'your Eminence'."

 

The fourth catholic man then says, "My son is pope. When he walks into a room people call him 'your holiness'."

 

Since the lone catholic woman was sipping her coffee in silence, the four men give her a subtle, "Well...."

 

She proudly replies, "I have a daughter, silm, tall, 38D bust, 24waist and 34 hips. When she walks into a room, people say 'Oh, my God!'."

 

Today's word 20100912 Rho Inseon

Word - Deportation
 
Difinistion : Deportation means the expulsion of a person or group of people from a place or country

Article 20100911 contributed by Rho Inseon

Title - U.S. shifts approach to deporting illegal immigrantst

 

By Marcus Stern, ProPublica

The Obama administration is changing the federal immigration enforcement strategy in ways that reduce the threat of deportation for millions of illegal immigrants, even as states such as Arizona, Colorado, Virginia, Ohio and Texas are pushing to accelerate deportations.

 

The changes focus enforcement on immigrants who have committed serious crimes, an effort to unclog immigration courts and detention centers. A record backlog of deportation cases has forced immigrants to wait an average 459 days for their hearings, according to an Aug. 12 report by Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), which analyzes government data.

 

FULL COVERAGE: Immigration policy in the USA

SPEECH: Professors of pronunciation help immigrants

MORE: Court voids local law targeting illegal immigrants

 

Among the recent changes:

• Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director John Morton ordered agency officials on Aug. 20 to begin dismissing deportation cases against people who haven't committed serious crimes and have credible immigration applications pending.

 

• A proposed directive from Morton posted on ICE's website for public comment last month would generally prohibit police from using misdemeanor traffic stops to send people to ICE. Traffic stops have led to increased deportations in recent years, according to Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies at the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank whose research supports tighter enforcement.

 

The directive said exceptions would be made in certain cases, such as when immigrants have serious criminal records.

 

• ICE officers have been told to "exercise discretion" when deciding whether to detain "long-time lawful permanent residents, juveniles, the immediate family members of U.S. citizens, veterans, members of the armed forces and their families, and others with illnesses or special circumstances," Daniel Ragsdale, ICE executive associate director of management, testified July 1 in the administration's lawsuit to block Arizona's controversial immigration law. The law requires police officers to determine the immigration status of suspects stopped for another offense if there was a "reasonable suspicion" they are in the USA illegally. A U.S. district judge has held up the provision pending review.

 

• A draft memo from ICE's sister agency, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service, to Morton discussed ways the administration could adjust regulations so certain groups, such as college students and the spouses of military personnel, could legalize their status or at least avoid deportation if Congress doesn't pass comprehensive immigration reform. USCIS rules on applications for visas, work permits and citizenship. USCIS spokesman Christopher Bentley said the memo was intended to stimulate brainstorming on how to legalize immigrants if new laws aren't passed.

 

The administration's new direction puts it at odds with those who believe the nation's immigration laws should be strictly enforced and that all illegal immigrants should be deported.

 

ICE is "thumbing its nose at the law," said Rep. Steve King of Iowa, the top Republican on the House immigration subcommittee.

 

The changes have also drawn complaints from immigration advocates. They say deportations under Obama are at record highs and immigrants who remain behind are living in limbo, without work permits, Social Security cards or driver's licenses.

 

"This isn't a free ticket," said Raed Gonzalez, a Houston attorney who saw cases against his clients dropped last month. "The government can put them back into proceedings at any time."

 

Morton said in an interview that the new strategy is smarter, not softer, enforcement. At a time when more than 10 million people are in the country illegally, record sums are spent on enforcement and the federal budget faces huge deficits, it makes sense to target people who pose the biggest threat to public safety or national security, he said.

"Congress provides enough money to deport a little less than 400,000 people," Morton said. "My perspective is those 400,000 people shouldn't be the first 400,000 people in the door but rather 400,000 people who reflect some considered government enforcement policy based on a rational set of objectives and priorities."

 

ICE statistics show that deportations have increased dramatically from 189,000 in 2001 to 387,000 in 2009. Much of the increase results from deportations of people who haven't committed serious crimes, according to TRAC.

 

This year, however, that trend took a sharp turn, according to an Aug. 12 TRAC report.

 

The number of criminal immigrants removed by ICE "climbed to an all-time high," the report said. In fiscal 2010, which began Oct. 1, "The removal pace of criminal aliens ... is fully 60% higher than in the last year of the Bush administration, and at least a third (37%) higher than in the first year of the Obama administration."

 

From USA today