Posted on 02/28/2014 9:13:21 AM PST by xzins
The Main Stream Media is missing the real story on the Republican Party’s suicidal push for an Amnesty/Immigration Surge. The Party may be on the brink of a sweeping realignment—and the critical transformative figure is Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama.
This realignment is likely because, regardless of the outcome of the upcoming battles over legalizing the tens of millions of illegal infiltrators in Occupied America, the Republican leadership has already failed. Key Treason Lobby figures within the GOP are clearly feeling the heat. Even if the disaster of an Amnesty/ Immigration Surge passes, the GOP base is well aware of the treachery of its own leadership and is looking for alternatives.
Thus according to Neil Munro of the Daily Caller (whose days as a journalist within the Beltway Right are surely numbered), House Majority Leader Eric Cantor frantically changed the subject when pressed by CBS reporter Major Garrett “if the GOP plan would allow the 12 million illegal immigrants to get citizenship.” Instead, Cantor began babbling about “job growth and the lack of job growth,” without making any connection between those subjects and the likely consequences of flooding the labor market with helots. [GOP Leaders Hide Immigration Plans, February 3, 2014]
Meanwhile, Paul Ryan has attempted a bit of misdirection by claiming that that it is “clearly in doubt” that Congress can pass an immigration bill this year. [Are immigration reformers talking down chances so opponents will drop guard? By Byron York, Washington Examiner, February 3, 2014]. However, what is significant is that this tactic is openly being called out as possible misdirection.
The Republican leadership’s sudden cowardice has been triggered by the surprisingly stiff resistance of the GOP House Caucus to passing Amnesty. According to Jonathon Strong of Breitbart.com, a closed door session of Republican Congresscritters revealed that 80% were opposed to moving on a bill this year. Speaker John Boehner and Ryan were apparently both restrained in their rhetorical support for amnesty in this meeting, as ordinary Congressman neither trust Barack Obama to enforce security measures nor the leadership’s promises that an Amnesty/immigration Surge would be politically beneficial. [Did Showdown Kill Boehner’s Immigration Dreams?” January 31, 2014]
Hilariously, Ryan is even saying that for an immigration bill to go anywhere, it has to be based on “security first, no amnesty” and only “then we might be able to get somewhere.” [U.S. immigration bill “in doubt” this year, Republican Ryan says, by Margaret Chadbourn, Reuters, February 2, 2014] (Mickey Kaus catches Ryan outright lying about this (“distorting and dissembling weren’t getting the job done, I guess”) on ABC’s This Week With George Stephanopoulos).
The conclusion – the Republican leadership isn’t composed of “leaders” at all. GOP Congressmen are not listening to the likes of Boehner, Ryan, and Cantor. Speaker Boehner resembles one of those late Roman Emperors who is a prisoner of his own soldiers.
So who could command the loyalty of the troops? The answer: Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama, who is blazing a new and promising trail for the Republican Party politically, and ultimately more important, ideologically.
In a break with precedent, Senator Sessions organized a secret meeting on January 23 with staffers from over a dozen House offices to sabotage the GOP leadership’s Amnesty plans. The invitation sent from Senator Sessions’ office bragged that “Over here in the Senate working for Senator Sessions, we learned a lot last year about the strategies employed by the powerful forces pushing bad immigration policies--and how to counter them.” [House Conservatives Plot Takedown of GOP Leaders’ Amnesty Plans, by Matthew Boyle, Breitbart, January 23, 2014]
The result: a well-organized insurgency during the much-ballyhooed immigration strategy session of the House of GOP. Armed with anti-Amnesty talking points by Senator Sessions and his staff, House Republicans had a detailed set of responses to every single predictable talking point that could have been offered by the pro-amnesty Republican leadership.
Senator Sessions and his staff also set a trap for the Republican leadership by pointing out that any compromise solution would ultimately have “loopholes and waivers that could be utilized by or granted to illegal aliens by the Obama administration.” [Exclusive: Sessions Arms House Republicans Against Boehner Immigration Push, by Matthew Boyle, Breitbart, January 29, 2014] Boehner, Ryan, and Cantor would essentially have to publicly declare that they trust President Obama more than they trust their own base.
In terms of political power over the House GOP, Senator Sessions is the real Republican leadership.
Sessions is arguing for a fundamental reframing of the way the conservative movement views the immigration issue. In contrast to libertarian and Conservatism Inc. court eunuchs who view the historic American nation as kulaks to be dispossessed, Sessions is saying that the core principle of real immigration reform should be “helping millions of jobless Americans get back to work.” As Sessions put it, “President Obama and Senate Democrats have uniformly embraced an immigration plan that would devastate wages and working conditions for millions of struggling Americans to benefit a small cadre of lobbyists and CEOs.”
Nor is this some recent deviation from Sessions. As he said in November,
America is not an oligarchy… A Republic must answer to the people…Congressional leaders must forcefully reject the notion, evidently accepted by the president, that a small cadre of CEOs can tailor the nation’s entire immigration policy to suit their narrow interests.
[Sen. Sessions slams Obama, CEOs on immigration, by Neil Munro, Daily Caller, November 25, 2013]
This argument is political dynamite to the corporate lobbyists and low-rent sophomoric collaborationists who comprise what passes for the American Right.
And the argument is spreading.
Senator Ted Cruz, who was noticeably reticent when the Senate passed the Gang of Eight’s version of the Amnesty/ Immigration Surge, is now sounding a populist, even class warfare note. Thus Cruz said recently: “Rather than responding to the big-money lobbying on K Street, we need to make sure working-class Americans show up by the millions to reject Obamacare and vote out the Democrats.” [Amnesty fight stirs GOP fight over voters’ wages, by Neil Munro, Daily Caller, February 1, 2014]
This type of attack is being echoed by other congressional opponents of Amnesty, to the distress of the Republican Party’s nominal leaders who want to deliver for the Chamber of Commerce.
Thus Republicans have the rare opportunity to be on the right side of an economically populist issue. Immigration increases are opposed by the majority of lower-income and middle-income voters, and by political moderates and conservatives. Furthermore, a plurality of African-Americans also oppose the higher levels of immigration proposed in the House and Senate bills. [Poll: Wealthy, liberals unite to support increased immigration, by Neil Munro, Daily Caller, January 20, 2014]
If it continues to spread in influence, the political philosophy of Jeff Sessions would represent the first serious reintroduction of National Conservatism in American politics since the (deliberate) destruction of Pat Buchanan.
The main obstacle of course: the money provided by the Open Borders donor class.
But with the slow motion collapse of Chris Christie, the GOP Establishment’s Great Wide Hope, the 2016 field is wide open. The battle over the Amnesty/Immigration may prove simply the first clash in a greater war to define the future of the Republican Party.
Senator Sessions has already dealt the Treason Lobby a serious setback. If he can rally the House GOP to defeat Obama and Boehner’s amnesty push, he will take his place as the most important leader of the American Right since Reagan.
And with a fractured 2016 field, Sessions may have a great opportunity to save the future of his party—and his country.
Sessions is the most consistent conservative of any long-serving US politician.
He’s one of the few worth much of anything in the Senate these days. A rare good egg.
He ought to be the next AG or SCotUS Chief Justice.
God bless him!!!!
God bless and keep this good man....Sen Sessions.
He appears to be the behind the scenes leader.
Good on him!
Being from Alabama, I am extremely proud of, and thankful for, Senator Sessions.
Ditto!
I am proud that Sen. Sessions represents my state. He has done a great job for Alabama and the USA.
A great senator for all Americans.
Hope the Dims have room for all those RINOs.
I wish I could say the same regarding our GA sens.
God bless Jeff Sessions
Thanks, xzins, for posting this.
I am a huge fan of Jeff Sessions!
Sessions For President. Who doesn’t love Jeff? Definitly, he should be the Republican Leader in the senate, whether in the majority or minority, he should be the leader.
I guess off hand, I can’t think of a time when Jeff has been off course. He is a master at senate rules and a gifted stratagist with plenty of real time experience.
It is very unfortunate that he is so often confused with Texas Pete (Sessions), who regularly plays the role of a jerk, and occasionally benefits from Jeff’s good name, in the confusion.
“But with the slow motion collapse of Chris Christie, the GOP Establishment’s Great Wide Hope, the 2016 field is wide open.”
“Great Wide Hope” is a perfect line to denigrate that RINO bastard!
In 1986, Reagan nominated Sessions to be a judge of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Alabama.[6] Sessions judicial nomination was recommended and actively backed by Republican Alabama Senator Jeremiah Denton.[7] A substantial majority of the American Bar Association Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary, which rates nominees to the federal bench, rated Sessions "qualified," with a minority voting that Sessions was "not qualified."[8]
At Sessions' confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee, four Department of Justice lawyers who had worked with Sessions testified that he had made several racist statements. One of those lawyers, J. Gerald Hebert, testified that Sessions had referred to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) as "un-American" and "Communist-inspired" because they "forced civil rights down the throats of people."[9]
In response to a question from Joe Biden on whether he had called the NAACP and other civil rights organizations "un-American", Sessions replied "I'm often loose with my tongue. I may have said something about the NAACP being un-American or Communist, but I meant no harm by it."[8]
On June 5, 1986, the Committee voted 10–8 against recommending the nomination to the Senate floor, with Republican Senators Charles Mathias of Maryland and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania voting with the Democrats. It then split 9–9 on a vote to send Sessions' nomination to the Senate floor with no recommendation, this time with Specter in support. A majority was required for the nomination to proceed.[13] The pivotal votes against Sessions came from Democratic Senator Howell Heflin of Alabama. Although Heflin had previously backed Sessions, he began to oppose Sessions after hearing testimony, concluding that there were "reasonable doubts" over Sessions' ability to be "fair and impartial." The nomination was withdrawn on July 31, 1986.
Sessions became only the second nominee to the federal judiciary in 48 years whose nomination was killed by the Senate Judiciary Committee.[10]
After joining the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sessions remarked that his presence there, alongside several of the members who voted against him, was a "great irony."[14] When Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania left the GOP to join the Democratic Party on April 28, 2009, Sessions was selected to be the Ranking Member on the Senate Judiciary Committee. At that time, Specter said that his vote against Sessions' nomination was a mistake, because he had "since found that Sen. Sessions is egalitarian."[17]
So why isn't he the Speaker? Sounds like the author's conclusion is incorrect.
I'm from DE and I call his office in DC regularly to tell him just that.
I think the idea had more to due with what a leader truly is than it had to do with who is currently holding a particular office.
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