Immigration Bill's Demise Not a Reason to Cheer (Arizona Star barf alert)

Arizona Daily Star ^ | 7/1/7 | the editors

[hardback]

Immigration bill's demise not a reason to cheer Our view: Senate's failure to act will not make our borders any safer, or make the 12 million illegal residents go away

Tucson, Arizona | Published: 07.01.2007 By the end of last week, every politician who could get to a phone or a computer was eager to let the world know how disappointed he or she was over the death of the immigration bill.

Those were the people, like Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., who had made a valiant but unsuccessful effort to create an immigration bill that would lure hard-liners from the far right and far left into the center. That didn't happen. Narrow-mindedness won the day. Anyone who sees this as a victory for America is living in a fantasyland.

Arizona Republican Party Chairman Randy Pullen reflected the views of many of the critics when he declared that the defeat of the immigration bill was "a great day for Americans in general and the grassroots of the Republican Party."

The Minuteman Civil Defense Corps called the death of the immigration bill "a small but significant victory . . . in the fight to secure our nation's borders."

It is questionable whether either Pullen or the militia reflects the views of most Republicans or most Americans. Certainly their views are opposite of those expressed repeatedly on the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal, which is arguably the most conservative mainstream newspaper in the country.

There is no question, however, that both Pullen and the militia reflect an opinion consistent with that of the John Birch Society, which says, "The problem facing the nation along the southern border with Mexico is not so much immigration as invasion."

By extension, this view holds that those here illegally are nothing more than criminals, regardless of how long they've been here or what their achievements have been or how much they have contributed to the U.S. economy. But those who cheer the death of the immigration bill in effect cheer the death of progress. The bill's defeat does nothing except maintain the status quo, which is precisely what the critics were fighting against. By a roll-call vote of 46-53, those who were unhappy with the bill basically shot themselves in the foot.

Failure to adopt a comprehensive immigration law will not result in a protective bubble over the United States, nor will it lead to a long line of buses carrying 12 million illegal residents out of the country.

On the contrary, maintaining the status quo means the estimated 12 million undocumented workers will continue playing a game of cat and mouse with immigration authorities. The rejected bill would have set up a system for bringing those people out of the shadows. Amnesty was not a gift without strings; certainly it led to citizenship, but it was a difficult and cumbersome process. It was not carte blanche.

The bill that died addressed that issue, as well as the need for beefed up border security. Voting to allow the bill to proceed by ending debate were 33 Democrats, 12 Republicans — including Kyl and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. — and independent Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut. Voting to block the bill by allowing debate to continue were 37 Republicans, 15 Democrats and independent Bernard Sanders of Vermont. One senator, Tim Johnson, D-S.D., did not vote.

Kyl's theory is that the bill's failure was part of the larger voter backlash. A significant number of Americans, he says, lack confidence in the government's ability to secure the border, issue passports and take care of emergencies like Hurricane Katrina.

"Conservative activists," Kyl said, have "a very firm view that the government is unable to get anything right." Those activists had "a huge impact" on the Senate vote, he said.

Kyl may be right, but it seems to be the most positive spin possible to explain the influence of a bunch of fear-mongering, do-nothing pontificators who have been polluting the airwaves all year.

Now they've achieved their goal, which means Congress will not revisit the immigration issue until after the 2008 presidential election. In the 12 days that ended on Wednesday, 11 bodies were found in the desert between the Mexican border and Tucson.

How many more will die before Congress musters the courage to act on an immigration bill that includes a humane process for regulating the flow of foreign workers into the United States?

We've heard all the critics who say such laws already exist, of course, but it doesn't take a genius to see that those laws are not working.

A new approach is needed that includes a guest-worker program, tighter border security and a way to legalize those who are here and have proved themselves worthy of citizenship.

Every member of Congress knows that is needed. However, it is revealing that even a bipartisan effort led by Kyl, a staunch conservative, and Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., a staunch liberal, was unable to build a consensus.

The immigration vote was one that will cost us dearly until more reasonable voices make themselves heard.

[Clintonfatigued]

The defeat of this bill is a positive first step. More needs to be done, obviously, including patriots coming up with a proposal of their own. But this is a good beginning.

[CAWats]

No Am Nasty.

[SandRat]

All this is according to the ARIZONA RED STAR errrr.... DAILY STAR.

[UCFRoadWarrior]

Bashing America and Americans is no way to push an immigration/amnesty agenda.

Americans are tired of being called racists, by racists

[curiosity]

Yes, it was a victory for the status quo, and there's nothing wrong with that. The fact is, the status quo, however bad, is still better than the bill. Sometimes we have to choose the lesser of two evils, and in this case, that would be the status quo.

Now that this horrible bill is dead, it is time to introduce an alternative. While it will be hard, I think there is now a historic opporunity to pass a good enforcement bill. The drubbing the "grand bargainers" took last week was so bad, and the American people's demand for enforcement so overwhelming, that there might be just enough GOP and blue dog legislators to get through an enforcement-only bill. Time will tell.

[SoCalRight]

Some “expert” on “Meet The Press” today said, with the bill’s failure, it will be impossible for Republicans to ever win Florida in the presidential race and, without Florida, “no arithmatic exists that lets them win the White House.”

So I guess we’re screwed, might as well just kill ourselves, not even field a candidate next time. Oh well.

[2ndDivisionVet]

Demand a border fence! Build it NOW!! Beef up the border patrol and close our borders!

U.S. Senate switchboard: (202) 224-3121

U.S. House switchboard: (202) 225-3121

White House comments: (202) 456-1111

Find your House Rep.: http://www.house.gov/writerep

Find your US Senators: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

Toll free to the US Senate:

1-800-882-2005. (Spanish number)
1-800-417-7666. (English number)

Courtesy of a pro-amnesty group, no less!!

[Paulus Invictus]

"How many more will die before Congress musters the courage to act on an immigration bill that includes a humane process for regulating the flow of foreign workers into the United States?"

How do they intend to regulate what the RATs and a few RINOS + Bush wanted to entirely de-regulate ? The brain dead left never gets it and never will. As for the deaths of illegals trying to cross the hot desert in the summertime, here's a reminder: for every human act there is a consequence, and there are often bad consequences to risky acts.

[weaponeer]

"...this view holds that those here illegally are nothing more than criminals..."

Well, duh?

[curiosity]

Some “expert” on “Meet The Press” today said, with the bill’s failure, it will be impossible for Republicans to ever win Florida in the presidential race and, without Florida, “no arithmatic exists that lets them win the White House.”

Yes, I saw that. It amazes me how such supposedly "elite" journalists just blindly accept conventional wisdom without critically examining whether it is supported by the facts. National polls of hispanics don't show overwhelming support for amnesty. Some have even showed majority opposition to it.

As to Florida, I seriously doubt Floridian Hispanic voters support this bill in large numbers. If anything, they resent the fact that so many Mexicans who just walked in here would get amnesty, while at the same time the Coast Guard goes around zealously intercepting their freedom-seeking relatives in the Atlantic and sending them back to Castro.

[LadyNavyVet]

Doncha just love the new refrain from the OBL? I’ve heard over and over the past few days that “the borders didn’t get any better” with the demise of the bill. No, they did not. But they didn’t get any worse, either, as they most assuredly would have had this travesty of an immigration bill passed.

I’ll take the status quo for now. It is many orders of magnitude better than amnesty.

[Baladas]

Typical MSM elitism:

... Narrow-mindedness won the day. Anyone who sees this as a victory for America is living in a fantasyland.

Yeah, we all know communist reporters aren't narrow-minded and deal in reality every frickin' time. Face it, you got your ass handed to ya. Yes, your medium IS in decline, and there's nothing you can do about except whine some more.

[kingu]

The center, as defined by countless polls says that the border should be locked down and illegals deported. The bill said that locking down the border should be looked at and illegals should be made legal.

So the fallacy of the editorial is that the center was represented at all.

[TheLawyerFormerlyKnownAsAl]

Senate's failure to act will not make our borders any safer, or make the 12 million illegal residents go away

So they set up the straw man in the very first sentence. We killed a bad bill, period. Nobody said that killing it would make our borders safer or make the 12(-30)-million illegals go away.

[engrpat]

The really sad thing is all of these editorials, etc, about the immigration legislation never discuss what was actually in the bill. They don’t talk about the fact that the bill really wasn’t totally written, wasn’t ready for prime time. They don’t talk about the way the bill was pushed with no hearings just vote yest and move along.

[LearnsFromMistakes]

By extension, this view holds that those here illegally are nothing more than criminals

Too funny - you need an 'extension' to veiw 'those here ilegally' as 'criminals'. They can't be serious, can they?

[R.W.Ratikal]

Congress learned long ago that if at first you don’t succeed try, try again.

A “new” immigration bill will now be introduced to get accomplished by the anti-Americans wanted to accomplish with the first bill.

If that doesn’t work they will try again. I am old enough to remember when Teddy Kennedy first introduced a universal health care bill in the Seventies. Ho many times has a similar bill been defeated? Yet it is the centerpiece for leading Democrat presidential candidates” campaigns.

In the immigration war, Congress is on the illegal aliens” side against Americans. Congress might not have noticed, but we outnumber them. TERM LIMITS!