Senate immigration overhaul in doubt
By Donna Smith
Thu Apr 6, 2006 11:18 PM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A U.S. Senate compromise on an overhaul of immigration law appeared to get bogged down late on Thursday in the face of opposition by some Republicans who say it would give amnesty to lawbreakers.
It appeared unlikely the Senate would approve before a two-week congressional break on Friday the radical immigration reform that would give millions of illegal immigrants a chance to earn U.S. citizenship.
The bill’s backers expressed fear that failure to enact the legislation before lawmakers leave for their spring break could hurt its chances in a congressional election year.
Senate Republican Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee and Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada earlier hailed a “breakthrough” on the compromise bill that would include a guest worker program sought by President George W. Bush.
But the two leaders were unable to agree on how many amendments to the bill would be allowed.
I was honestly ambivalent about the Dubai Ports World deal. It didn’t seem to matter much either way, and it’s fine with me that the deal got queered in the end.
The illegal immigration issue cuts deeper. Citizens appear to take it even more seriously than the ports deal, but are offset by business money and the huge number of future votes the illegals represent. Will our elected officials preserve our country, or will they sell us out?
When immigration came to a head 20 years ago we let the politicians and businesses have their way and give 1+ million illegals amnesty “just this once.” What did it get us? Empty promises that they’d improve border enforcement and streamline legal immigration. Fast forward 20 years and we’ve got 10+ million illegals. They want another amnesty but refuse to acknowledge that that’s what it is.
“They have to pay a fine, they go to the end of the line.” “We just can’t have strict enforcement without a guest worker program.” “It’s not practical to deport them.” “They’re doing jobs Americans won’t do.” “They’re hard workers.” “They pay taxes.” “They built this country.”
Enough of this bullshit. It’s clear where this is going. We’re either going to get some watered down compromise that is basically amnesty along with some hollow promises to do more on enforcement (riiiight), or we’re going to get a lotta hot air and no action, which is to say the status quo of the last 20 years.
That’s not good enough. We are literally suffering an invasion. People, drugs, the Mexican army itself flow across our border and our government acts like it’s impossible to stop it. We can afford to send troops half a world away to conquer and police other countries, but we can’t stop the Mexican army, their drug smugglers, and their peasants?
It is absofreakinlutely absurd that in a post-9/11 world it’s still possible for unscrupulous business folks to influence unprincipled politicians to let dirt poor uneducated “workers” flood into the US. It’s too expensive to enforce our border with Mexico? It’s too expensive not to. Americans won’t do those jobs? Not for 3rd world wages they won’t. Stop the flow and the money we save on not subsidizing illegals will more than pay for the increase in wages to actual citizens.
Build a wall. Deny illegals participation in and the benefits of our society. No automatic citizenship for their children. Fine businesses who employ them. We won’t have to deport them. They will go home. If the economy takes a dive we can always fling open the border again. Right?
Let our politicians prove that they answer to the desires of their current citizen-voters by actually taking such steps, then we can talk about what kind of guest worker program we’ll create so they can ingratiate themselves to the future voters they seem so willing to sell us out in favor of.
This time if they get away with another “compromise” there’s not going to be a next time.