EckerNet.Com

With the relatively sudden defeat of the Amnesty Bill after weeks of frantic activity, it’s natural to suddenly ask “Ok, now what?”.

Well first of all, is this bill dead?? Yes and No.

Yes, it has failed two cloture votes and has been pulled from the floor. The coalition that originally brought it to the floor appears to have fragmented despite backroom negotiations that lasted so long that Harry Reid had to send the Sargeant-At-Arms to go retrieve the missing Senators.

No, because it can still be brought back to the floor at any times.

However, in my opinion, it’s dead. The Senate has other priorities right now, and the bill already took up two weeks more time than it was originally schedule for. They’ll be concentrating on other bills for awhile so it’s safe to say it’ll be several months before anyone has a chance to even think about bringing it up. By that time the Presidential race will be in full-swing and NOBODY will want to touch this political landmine. So I think we’re safe from this thing until after 2008.

However, now is not the time to get complacent. We need to make sure that our legislators understand that when they hear citizens bitching about immigration, it’s not that they want the borders deleted, they want the laws enforced.

On the plus side, from here on out, time is on our side. Building the fence and hiring more agents, that’s already a law on the books. We need to make sure that keeps happening. And as it does the situation will improve. I say that with certainty because we’ve seen what the San Diego fence did for California.

Once that starts happening an important card is playing in this giant poker game. No longer can that card be used to bluff. It’ll be harder for the pro-amnesty crowd to hold fences hostage and ask for amnesty as a ransom.

However, for this to all come true alot has to happen. We have to make sure that fence is built. Sure it’s not the full 2000 miles, but it’s 800. We need to make it get down. We need to make sure those border guards get hired, trained and assigned to immigration duties. And I add that last part because alot of you may not realize that instead of enforcing immigration, some of our Border Patrol agents have been guarding presidential candidates instead! We also need to keep on the government to keep up the raids. So far they’ve been used as a political stunt by Bush so he can pretend he’s serious about immigration.

Plus I fully expect a political hissy-fit from our pro-amnesty crowd, especially President Bush.  Basically the argument comes down to “Fine you didn’t legalize my gardner, I won’t build your fence, Neener Neener Neer”.  We need to keep that from happening.  After all, all we’re doing is asking them to follow the law.

One of the best tools we have to do this is our opponents own words. For weeks now President Bush, Skeletor Chertoff, Kennedy, McCain, etc have all been prancing around claiming this had to happen NOW because immigration was such a huge national security risk. Our borders were a weakness and we don’t know how many terrorists are “in the shadows”. Ok fine, then do something about it. There are already laws on the books that enable you to do something about it, so do it!! Anything short of that reveals your speeches as just political bullshit, and reveals you as being weak on national security.

So to all, I would say enjoy your victory. And yes, it was YOUR victory. The assholes in Washington tried to sell you to Mexico and you stood up. It wasn’t the lobbyists. It wasn’t big corporations. It wasn’t backroom dealings. All of those were tried, but they failed, because for at least a couple weeks most of America stood up and said in one voice “Knock that shit off you jerks!”. And the Senate heard you…and if only for a moment, they feared that collective unity and the clarity of your message. My hat is off to you, and a big congrats. I thank all of you who picked up a phone, a keyboard, a pen or sent a fax. Thank you.

But while we’re enjoying our moment, we have to remember there is alot of work yet to be done. And there is no better time than now to do it. I’ll keep doing what I’m doing, if you keep helping me. Together, eventually we might be able to see our dream.