Starting next week, consumers who buy one of the GPS-implanted detergent boxes will be surprised at home, given a pocket video camera as a prize and invited to bring their families to enjoy a day of Unilever-sponsored outdoor fun. The promotion, called Try Something New With Omo, is in keeping with the brand’s international “Dirt is Good” positioning that encourages parents to let their kids have a good time even if they get dirty.

Omo accounts for half of Brazil’s detergent sales and is already found in 80% of homes there, so Unilever’s goal is more to draw attention to a new stain-fighting version of Omo and get it talked about rather than looking for a big increase in sales.

That made the idea of doing a promotion where the prize finds the consumer, rather than the consumer having to look for the prize — and maybe not bothering — appealing.

Fernando Figueiredo, Bullet’s president, said the GPS device is activated when a shopper removes the detergent carton from the supermarket shelf. Fifty Omo boxes implanted with GPS devices have been scattered around Brazil, and Mr. Figueiredo has teams in 35 Brazilian cities ready to leap into action when a box is activated. The nearest team can reach the shopper’s home “within hours or days,” and if they’re really close by, “they may get to your house as soon as you do,” he said.

Once there, the teams have portable equipment that lets them go floor by floor in apartment buildings until they find the correct unit, he said.

Of course, Brazil has a high crime rate, and not everyone is going to open the door to strangers who claim to have been sent by her detergent brand to offer a free video camera. Bullet has thought of that. If the team tracks a consumer to her home but she won’t let them in, they can remotely activate a buzzer in the detergent box so that it starts beeping. And if the team takes too long to arrive, and the consumer has already opened the box to see if she’s a winner or just do laundry, she’ll find, along with the GPS device and less detergent than expected, a note explaining the promotion and a phone number to call.

“Anything can happen,” Mr. Figueiredo said. “We have to be innovative, but we don’t know what reaction to expect from consumers.”

In a big web component, the site experimentealgonovo.com.br (Portuguese for “try something new”) goes live in August, and will include a map showing roughly where the winners live, pictures of each winner and footage of the Bullet-Omo teams hunting down the GPS-enabled detergent boxes, knocking on doors and surprising consumers.

“It costs more than a traditional promotion and is riskier because it’s never been done before, but it’s worth it,” Mr. Figueiredo said. The technology aspect of the promotion costs less than $1 million, out of Omo’s overall marketing budget of about $23 million.

“We believe in using new technology for promotional marketing,” Mr. Figueiredo said.

Plus Bullet just likes figuring out how to ingeniously embed stuff in products. Two summers ago, sales of Unilever’s Fruttare Popsicles soared when Bullet disguised 10,000 iPod Shuffles as popsicles and popped them in freezer cases. The agency’s creatives had noticed while reading their iPod instruction manuals that an iPod can operate at temperatures below freezing. They immediately began freezing their own devices as a test, then constructed a fake ice-cream bar case that mimicked the popsicle but fit an iPod, and a wildly successful summer ice cream promotion was born.

by Stephen Dinan

With Congress gridlocked on an immigration bill, the Obama administration is considering using a back door to stop deporting many illegal immigrants – what a draft government memo said could be “a non-legislative version of amnesty.”

The memo, addressed to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Alejandro Mayorkas and written by four agency staffers, lists tools it says the administration has to “reduce the threat of removal” for many illegal immigrants who have run afoul of immigration authorities.

“In the absence of comprehensive immigration reform, USCIS can extend benefits and/or protections to many individuals and groups by issuing new guidance and regulations, exercising discretion with regard to parole-in-place, deferred action and the issuance of Notices to Appear,” the staffers wrote in the memo, which was obtained by Sen. Charles E. Grassley, Iowa Republican.

The memo suggests that in-depth discussions have occurred on how to keep many illegal immigrants in the country, which would be at least a temporary alternative to the proposals Democrats in Congress have made to legalize illegal immigrants.

Chris Bentley, a USCIS spokesman, said drafting the memo doesn’t mean the agency has embraced the policy and “nobody should mistake deliberation and exchange of ideas for final decisions.”

“As a matter of good government, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services will discuss just about every issue that comes within the purview of the immigration system,” he said in an e-mail statement. “We continue to maintain that comprehensive bipartisan legislation, coupled with smart, effective enforcement, is the only solution to our nation’s immigration challenges.”

He said the Homeland Security Department “will not grant deferred action or humanitarian parole to the nation’s entire illegal immigrant population.”

The memo does talk about targeting specific groups of illegal immigrants.

Mr. Grassley said it confirms his fears that the administration is trying an end-run around Congress.

“This memo gives credence to our concerns that the administration will go to great lengths to circumvent Congress and unilaterally execute a backdoor amnesty plan,” Mr. Grassley said.

The memo acknowledges some of the tools could be costly and might even require asking Congress for more money.

At one point, the authors acknowledge that widespread use of “deferred action” – or using prosecutorial discretion not to deport someone – would be “a non-legislative version of ‘amnesty.’ ”

The authors noted several options for deferred action, including targeting it to students who would be covered by the DREAM Act, a bill that’s been introduced in Congress.

In testifying to the Senate Judiciary Committee on May 11, Mr. Mayorkas first said he was unaware of discussions to use these kinds of tools on a categorical basis, then later clarified that officials had talked about expanding the use of those powers.

“I don’t know of any plans. I think we have discussed, as we always do, the tools available to us and whether the deployment of any of those tools could achieve a more fair and efficient use or application of the immigration law,” he said.

He acknowledged, though, that he was not aware that those powers had ever been used before on a categorical basis.

Sen. John Cornyn, the Texas Republican who queried Mr. Mayorkas on the subject, warned him against pursuing that strategy.

“I think it would be a mistake for the administration to use administrative action, like deferred action on a categorical basis, to deal with a large number of people who are here without proper legal documents to regularize their status without Congress‘ participation. I will just say that to you for what it’s worth,” Mr. Cornyn, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary immigration, border security and citizenship subcommittee, told Mr. Mayorkas.

“The American public’s confidence in the federal government’s ability and commitment to enforce our immigration laws is at an all-time low,” Mr. Cornyn said in a statement. “This apparent step to circumvent Congress – and avoid a transparent debate on how to fix our broken immigration system –  threatens to further erode public confidence in its government and makes it less likely we will ever reach consensus and pass credible border security and immigration reform.”

After reports earlier this year that the agency was working on these sorts of plans, Senate Republicans, led by Mr. Grassley, have sent letters to President Obama and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano asking for details.

In one letter, the senators warned the president against making an end-run around congressional authority to write immigration rules, and asked for Mr. Obama to promise that he would not use the rules to grant mass pardons.

Rosemary Jenks, government relations manager for NumbersUSA, an organization that advocates for stricter immigration limits, said the memo is “an outrageous usurpation of congressional authority. It is unconstitutional, and a slap in the face to the American people.”

She said that the memo could explain why the push for an immigration bill has faltered in Congress.

“This makes sense of the fact that [Senate Majority Leader Harry] Reid and [House Speaker Nancy] Pelosi and Obama are sitting back calmly content with not moving immigration reform this year – because they know Obama is trying to take care of it for them, without Democrats having to be tied down to a vote before the election,” she said.

On the other side of the political spectrum, immigrant rights groups have demanded that Mr. Obama halt deportations until he secures a broad legalization bill from Congress – legislation that supporters call “comprehensive immigration reform” because it would tackle enforcement, some aspects of legal immigration and the status of illegal immigrants at the same time.

Two senators earlier this year wrote asking the administration to use its powers to stop deporting students who might be eligible for the DREAM Act, which would allow illegal immigrant college students brought to the U.S. at a young age to gain legal status. The legislation has not been passed by Congress.

Mr. Obama has rejected halting deportations, but his administration has been more careful about whom it pursues.

According to new figures from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the administration has stepped up its efforts to deport illegal immigrants convicted of crimes, but removal of “non-criminal” illegal immigrants has slowed so far in fiscal 2010.

By Marilyn M. Brannan, Assoc. Editor

IRN/USA News

July 23, 2010

Last December, when a majority of Americans were caught up in holiday preparations (and probably paying less attention than usual to the political machinations in Washington), President Obama quietly signed an executive order that makes the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL), operating on our soil, immune from the restraints of American law.

The signing occurred almost clandestinely—“dead of night,” so to speak—on December 16, 2009.  And the shocking fact is, the transfer of power accomplished in that surreptitious action is nothing less than the authorization for an international law enforcement body to operate with complete immunity on American soil, beyond the reach of our own top law enforcement arm, the FBI, and immune from Freedom of Information Act requests and even the authority of the United States Congress!

INTERPOL was established in 1923, and operates in roughly 188 countries.  By executive order #12425, issued in 1983, President Reagan recognized Interpol as an international organization and gave it some of the privileges and immunities customarily extended to foreign diplomats.  However, INTERPOL is also an active law-enforcement agency; therefore, critical privileges and immunities (Section 2[c] of the International Organizations Immunities Act) were withheld by Reagan’s order. Specifically, property and assets of INTERPOL remained subject to search and seizure, and its archived records remained subject to public scrutiny under provisions like the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).  It has been the constraints of Fourth Amendment, FOIA, and other limitations imposed by the U.S. Constitution and federal law that have protected the liberty and privacy of Americans and prevented law-enforcement and its controlling government authority from becoming tyrannical.

But no longer. 

On December 16, 2009, President Obama issued an executive order that removed the Reagan limitations.  INTERPOL’s property and assets are no longer subject to search and confiscation, and its archives are now considered inviolable.  “Property and assets” could conceivably include human assets—Americans arrested on our soil by INTERPOL officers.  This international police force (headquartered in the Justice Department in Washington) will, by order of Barack Obama, be unrestrained by the U.S. Constitution and American law while it operates in the United States; it also affects Americans and American interests outside the United States.

INTERPOL works closely with international tribunals—such as the International Criminal Court, which the U.S. has refused to join because of its sovereignty surrendering provisions—but which the Obama administration wants the U.S. to join. INTERPOL works closely with foreign courts and law-enforcement authorities, such as those in Europe that are investigating former Bush administration officials for purported “war crimes”—in other words, actions taken in America’s defense.

Why Are the Media Silent?

This action by Obama was unlike the “legislative triumph” of ObamaCare in March, endlessly extolled in the controlled media (despite the fact that roughly 65 to 70% of Americans opposed its enactment).  Readers will remember a smiling but defiant Nancy Pelosi, surrounded by her entourage, carrying her huge gavel through a sea of Tea Party attendees to send a message to the American people:  the Obama/Reid/Pelosi Triumvirate will force Obama’s agenda on you—whether you like it or not.  

Tens of thousands of pages of hard copy “news” and months of radio and television coverage preceded the historic ObamaCare signing event, when press and photographers swarmed around the president for the “changing of the pens” ritual.  At that point, America lost her freedom to decide what health care in this country will consist of, how it will be paid for, and who will get it.

Our organization first reported on Obama’s quiet change to EO 12425 in January of 2010.  But why wasn’t this front-page news all across the nation?  Why has so little about this egregious power shift been published or aired on radio or television?

What Is Behind This?

Why would we elevate an international police force above American law?  Why would we immunize an international police force from the limitations that constrain the FBI and other American law-enforcement agencies?  Why is it suddenly necessary to have, within the Justice Department, a repository for stashing government files which, therefore, will be beyond the ability of Congress, American law-enforcement, the media, and the American people to scrutinize? Those are questions asked by former federal prosecutor, Andrew C. McCarthy, writing at National Review Online.[1] 

At least one answer to these questions is very clear.  A coup is underway in the United States of America, the goal of which is to establish complete, unquestioned authority over the citizens—a ‘fundamental change’ to the United States where citizens have no legal recourse against an authoritarian central government.”

By the stroke of his pen, Barack Obama removed all legal authority that American citizens formerly had to demand documentation concerning any charges brought against them. Forget habeas corpus.  Forget Constitutional protections.  Forget the Bill of Rights. 

The liberal media—which are increasingly revealing themselves to be the propaganda arm of the far Left and this current administration—have been appallingly silent. 

The American people have reason to be alarmed about this.

They should be contacting their representatives in Congress, asking pointed questions, demanding to know why this stealth action, which has virtually put all of us under international police power, has not been exposed.