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Since the Arizona immigration law, the response has been mostly positive, which isn\’t surprising considering the polls on the topic.  As usual, the open-borders crowd is trying to raise the body of Heinrich Himmler and prop him in front of a Border Patrol car, but beyond that the few complaints have been either been emotional (not logical) ranting or extreme distortion of fact.

Past couple of days, one \”attempt\” to make a real argument against the Arizona law has gotten some links….why I\’m not sure, since I\’m not even sure it qualifies as unpersuasive.  Basically it\’s arguments boil down to two different points.

1) Carrying documentation is hard and stuff
2) Federal immigration law is a slippery slope

Allow me to address both.

Carrying documentation is hard and stuff

The AZ law is apparently evil because before immigrants mostly had to worry about carrying their papers when they were likely to run into federal officers (border checkpoints, airports, etc).  Now they have to carry them all the time because they might run into law enforcement officials.

My response? Boo fricking hoo.

My somewhat more intelligent response?? It\’s a green card….you carry it in your wallet.  Problem solved.  I carry credit cards I haven\’t used in seven years just because I might need to one day.  Really this is no more burden than that.  It\’s a card, perhaps an ounce of weight.  Beyond that, it\’s a almost laughable burden for the privilege of being allowed to be here.

When I was on the radio last weekend, discussing this very immigration law, I had the privilege of several people calling in who were immigrants, one from Germany and the other I don\’t recall (if I was even told), and neither had any problem with having to carrying documentation, and according to their statements carried every day without trouble.

We ask people to carry a driver\’s license to drive and I don\’t hear anyone screaming about Nazis then…

Federal immigration law is a slippery slope

To be honest I\’m not sure if this is a real argument or something that was just tagged on the end as filler.  Apparently the argument is that asking someone to carry papers is a slippery slope and opens up to all sorts of abuse of freedom.

First of all, this \”slippery slope\” has been in place since 1940, and so far nothing has slid down it…which make me wondering how slippery or even \”slope-ish\” it could possibly be.  Again let me use the example of driver\’s license.  In order to drive, you need to have a license on you at all times to present if you should run into a law enforcement officer.  I must have missed the cries of Nazi and Facist on that.  And immigration isn\’t a right, it\’s a privilege, you get your rights after you become a US citizen….at which point you\’re not required to carry that documentation anymore.  So since this doesn\’t even apply to US Citizens, I\’m not sure how this is any sort of slippery slope….even less so than driver\’s licenses, which have hardly been the downfall of democracy.

In short, I welcome weak attempts like this at arguing against immigration enforcement.  As it demonstrates rather convincingly how weak the other side\’s argument really is.

[Crossposted at True North]

To wrapup coverage of the immigration issue which has been at the top of the news lately, I figured I\’d top it off with the issue that probably relight this smoldering powderkeg….the Arizona immigration Law (SB1070).  Despite it being a relatively minor bill as far as actual legal impact, there has been a lot of demagoguery of the bill.  I figured I\’d tackle some of the bigger myths, and conveniently, the Washington Examiner already collected a list of the 10 dumbest things said about the bill.

1. “The statute requires police officers to stop and question anyone who looks like an illegal immigrant.”
– New York Times editorial

Actually no it doesn\’t.  The law doesn\’t take effect until after a police officer has already stopped, detained or arrested someone.    It\’s only after this point, if the officer has reasonable suspicion that the suspect is an illegal immigrant that he has to determine their immigration status.

In that sense the law is actually MORE restrictive than federal law, upheld by the Supreme Court (Muehler vs Mena 2005), which states that officers do NOT need reasonable suspicion to justify asking a suspect about their immigration status.  The Supreme Court has \”held repeatedly that mere police questioning does not constitute a seizure\” under the Fourth Amendment.

2. “As the Arizona abomination makes clear, there is a desperate need for federal immigration action to stop the country from turning into a nation of vigilantes suspicious of anybody with dark skin.”
– Dana Milbank, Washington Post

Dana is correct that there is a desperate need for federal immigration action, and the federal government has repeatedly refused, under both Republicans and Democrats, to enforce their own immigration laws.

The other claim has absolutely no factual support.  In fact the law (as amended by HB2162), specifically states that race, color or national origin can NOT be taken into consideration.

3. “I can’t imagine Arizonans now reverting to German Nazi and Russian Communist techniques whereby people are required to turn one another in to the authorities on any suspicion of documentation.”
– Cardinal Roger Mahony

Actually nobody is required to turn in anyone, and this bill mentions nothing of the sort.  This bill only affects police officers, and then only concerning people they already have contact with in the execution of their duties. This bill never even comes close to mention ANYTHING like this.

The good Cardinal might want to read through his Ten Commandments again, as number nine specifically forbids lying.  And considering this bill never even comes close to stating what he\’s implying, I can only interpret his remarks as willful misinformation.

4. “This law creates a suspect class, based in part on ethnicity, considered guilty until they prove themselves innocent. It makes it harder for illegal immigrants to live without scrutiny — but it also makes it harder for some American citizens to live without suspicion and humiliation. Americans are not accustomed to the command ‘Your papers, please,’ however politely delivered. The distinctly American response to such a request would be ‘Go to hell,’ and then ‘See you in court.’”
– Michael Gerson, Washington Post

Oh where do I start?? First of all, as I already pointed out, police can not even take ethnicity into account.  Moreover, if is already a federal crime (8 USCS 1304(a) and 1306(e)) for aliens to fail to carry their registration documents.  And that has been the case since 1940….remember, back when we were actually dealing with Nazis??  Nobody has complained about it since.

5. “In case the phrase ‘lawful contact’ makes it appear as if the police are authorized to act only if they observe an undocumented-looking person actually committing a crime, another section strips the statute of even that fig leaf of reassurance. ‘A person is guilty of trespassing,’ the law provides, by being ‘present on any public or private land in this state’ while lacking authorization to be in the United States — a new crime of breathing while undocumented.”
– Linda Greenhouse, New York Times

(Greenhouse’s “trespassing” allegation was based on an early version of the Arizona bill that was not the bill that became law.  Her mistake was later removed from the Times site, but you can see original version here.)

Granted this appears to have been retracted but I address it here, because so far, from what I\’ve seen, most of the people criticising the bill have no idea what\’s actually in it.

6. “Federal law treats illegal immigration as a civil violation; Arizona law criminalizes it by using the legally dubious mechanism of equating the mere presence of undocumented immigrants with trespassing.”
– Washington Post editorial

(This editorial makes the same mistake as Linda Greenhouse’s “trespassing” column above.)

Actually this bill just creates a state penalty that mirrors what is already a federal CRIME.  But again, you\’re ill informed.

7. “I am saddened today at the prospect of a young Hispanic immigrant in Arizona going to the grocery store and forgetting to bring her passport and immigration documents with her. I cannot be dispassionate about the fact that the very act of her being in the grocery store will soon be a crime in the state she lives in…An immigrant who is charged with the crime of trespassing for simply being in a community without his papers on him is being told he is committing a crime by simply being.”
– Bishop Desmond Tutu, Huffington Post

I miss the good old days when you could rely on the word of a man of the cloth.

If this immigrant is here illegally, then yes their mere presence is a crime, and always has been.  This Arizona law doesn\’t change that.  And if that immigrant is here legally, they are already required to carry their documentation with them, and that\’s been the case since 1940.  If you\’ve ever travelled abroad, you\’ll know that most other country have similar laws.

8. “It harkens back to apartheid where all black people in South Africa were required to carry documents in order to move from one part of town to another.”
– Cynthia Tucker, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, on ABC’s “This Week”

Actually it harkens back to 1940, which is how long this has already been required by federal law.  Nothing is new here.

9. “You can imagine, if you are a Hispanic American in Arizona…suddenly, if you don’t have your papers and you took your kid out to get ice cream, you’re going to be harassed.”
– President Barack Obama

For being a legal scholar, you apparently don\’t know much about the actual…..well, law.  For being in charge of enforcing federal law, you apparently have no idea what the federal law already is.

10. “This week, Arizona signed the toughest illegal immigration law in the country which will allow police to demand identification papers from anyone they suspect is in the country illegally. I know there’s some people in Arizona worried that Obama is acting like Hitler, but could we all agree that there’s nothing more Nazi than saying ‘Show me your papers?’ There’s never been a World War II movie that didn’t include the line ’show me your papers.’ It’s their catchphrase. Every time someone says ’show me your papers,’ Hitler’s family gets a residual check. So heads up, Arizona; that’s fascism. I know, I know, it’s a dry fascism, but it’s still fascism.”
– Seth Myers, “Saturday Night Live”

Again, aliens are already required to carry their documentation, and have been since 1940.  Back when we were fighting real Nazis and fascism.

There is also another myth I\’ve heard, that\’s not so much a statement but a generally dismissal of one of the key parts of the language of the bill.  That being that the term \”reasonable suspicion\” is a meaningless term.

Quite simply that\’s ridiculous.  \”Reasonable suspicion\” is a legal term that\’s been defined by the courts for decades.  Quite simply, it is when a person has been, is, or is about to be engaged in criminal activity based on specific and articulable facts.  It\’s most well known application is in defining, when what\’s known as a \”Terry Stop\”, can be performed, as decided in Terry vs Ohio.

It\’s very instructive that opponents of this immigration bill have to use obvious mistruths as propaganda against this bill.  It\’s comforting to know they apparently can\’t oppose it on it\’s own merits, or with actual factual arguments.

[Crossposted at True North, comments welcome]

Yesterday, I reviewed the immigration reform proposal put forth by Senator Reid, and basically dismissed it as insufficient to truly reform immigration, and a disingenuous effort to disguise the real motives of Reid and his allies.  However, what I didn\’t mention yesterday, because I was saving that for today, is that there are silver linings to his proposal and comments made by a number of other Senators lately.

Remember that back in the big immigration debates of 2007 and 2008, amnesty was the default position.  Enforcement was treated as a dirty word and consideration was soundly rejected by the Democrats.  Eventually, watered down versions of it were added, by Republicans, to amnesty bills as an effort to gain more votes for an amnesty for illegal aliens.

Fast forward to today…where enforcement is now the default position.  Oh sure amnesty is still being proposed, as I pointed out yesterday, but only wrapped in a pseudo-enforcement bill.  First, things like more agents on the border, stricter employer penalties and tighter border crossings are the attempted focus of bills being proposed by pro-amnesty Democrats.

The momentum has visibly shifted to the border enforcement side.  We\’re not on the outside looking in.  Our opponents are adopting some of our positions and trying to piggyback some of their onto it.  Enforcement is no longer a dirty word, despite the wishes of violent illegal alien criminals protesting in the streets.

Moreover, supporting enforcement is no longer a political risk, not that I\’m sure it ever really was.  The Arizona immigration bill definitely took the wind out of that sail.  Country wide, a large majority of the public either supports the bill or thinks it doesn\’t go far enough. Even more important, this is especially true in the Midwest and the Southwest, where most of the vulnerable incumbents are this election.

There is reason for cautious optimism people, as long as we keep fighting the good fight.

I\’ve said already that no immigration bill is going to happen this year, and I continue to maintain that\’s the case.  It\’s been obvious for awhile, and now even Obama is stating it.  The Democrats were going to use it as a wedge issue, but the Arizona bill has revealed this issue as a one in which the Democrats would be bonkers to take on.  As a result they wouldn\’t be splitting the Republican Party, they\’d be splitting their own, as even liberal Democrats would have to question supporting amnesty when a large majority favors the Arizona bill.

But Reid is trying anyway, and why not, his re-election is doomed anyway.  He may as well try a long shot…but pandering to the Hispanics in his state.  He\’s proposed a solution for immigration and it\’s destined for defeat, even though it actually is a huge departure from previous attempts, as it\’s actually sort of a enforcement first bill.  But as always the devil is in the details.

His proposal does suggest that enforcement measures have to be carried out before anything else.  This is true, it\’s also an disingenious, as there is no reason this issue needs to be dealt with comprehensively.  An enforcement bill can be passed now, and in a later Congress we can deal with the rest.  And actually more than likely we\’ll never actually need to address later issues, because if enforcement measures are actually implemented, the rest of the problem takes care of itself naturally and without any unnecessary demagoguery.

But back to the proposal, it does insist that some enforcement measures take place but it doesn\’t say how much.  Technically hiring one additional border guard and stationing him in a closet in Omaha fits the bill\’s language.  It also is very particular in avoiding any permanent enforcement measures (like fences and barriers), and keeps to ones that Congress can easily defund at their convenience later on when the heat is off.

A bipartisan commission is appointed, which is supposed to report back in 12 months, but there is no requirement that anything they say should actually be implemented.  Basically it\’s a useless gesture.  And there is no benchmarks for defining the border as \”secure\”.

As part of it\’s employment verification measures, the proposal suggests implementing an electronic system, called BELIEVE (Biometric Enrollment, Locally-stored Information, and Electronic Verification of Employment) to verify a potential employees work eligibility.  Of course, what\’s not mentioned is a system like this already exists and it\’s been proven to work.  Since the proposal suggests creating something rather than use the existing E-VERIFY, I can only assume there are ulterior motives at work.  Moreover, E-VERIFY, while imperfect, is rapidly improving, but the point is that it took 10 years to get here.  Building a new system would simply set us back another 10 years, which I suspect is the whole point.

And of course what would an immigration bill without some amnesty tossed in.  This proposal also includes the AgJobs bill, which is, despite what it\’s supporters claim, pure amnesty.  Also included is the DREAM Act, which provides for chain-migration and free instate-tuition for illegals. Together, these two Acts alone constitute the worst of all the amnesty proposals of the past. Moreover there is some slight of hand math in counting immigrant workers against a cap, which basically ensures that unemployment will stay at or above 8% unemployment.

And in addition to the covert amnesty listed already, there is also an overt amnesty, in which virtually everyone here illegally gets protected status for eight years, after which they get legal status.  The fact that they are committing a crime just by being here is ignored.  The \”back of the line\” provision claims to put illegal aliens at the back of the line….ignoring the fact that they aren\’t actually at the back of the line.  While those that are taking the legal path are waiting outside the country, those that illegally entered get to stay in the country, with legal protection.

Despite it\’s claims of being an enforcement only proposal, there is little to ensure that the enforcement efforts will actually be undertaken before the amnesty portions are enacted.  And even if those enforcement efforts are actually implemented, there is little to ensure that they would not simply be discontinued once amnesty has been declared.  In fact the few safeguards that would prevent otherwise are conspicuously absent from this proposal.

Sorry Reid, we\’ve seen amnesty before and this is one.  We\’ve been lied to before and are rightfully suspicious of any proposal you put forward, and this doesn\’t pass the scrutiny.  Moreover, there is absolutely no reason that immigration has to be handled as a comprehensive matter.  Arizona\’s new immigration bill was passed out of frustration with the Federal government.  Not the Federal government\’s lack of a comprehensive immigration plan, but rather with the Federal government\’s inability to enforce it\’s own laws and protect it\’s states from what is arguably a foreign invasion.

Despite being labeled the \”immigration guy\” around the local blogosphere, I\’ve been purposely ignoring this issue, because quite honestly this issue just doesn\’t have legs….not for at LEAST a year, probably longer.  Despite all their protestations otherwise, there is no possible way they are seriously tackling the immigration issue before November, and if November turns out like we all think it will, probably not for at least two years after that.

But regardless, the Democrats need to pander and I\’m enough of a political hack I can respect that, even if it is disingenuous.  But perhaps one of the most talked about aspects of this issue is the new position of John McCain

But on Monday, McCain was talking only about enforcement: \”The lesson is clear: First we have to secure the border,\” McCain said.  \”If you want to enact some other reforms, how can that be effective when you have a porous border?”

He\’s suddenly very pro border enforcement.  He\’s wanting to put National Guard on the border.  He\’s stopped the \”you\’re racist if you oppose amnesty\” talk.  So on and so on.  And it\’s very very easy to criticize McCain for flip-flopping just because he\’s facing a primary challenge, in fact it\’s my gut reaction.  But….and I can\’t believe I\’m doing this, I\’m actually going to defend McCain on immigration because…

…

Sorry, I had to vomit there for a little bit.

…

Ok, what was I saying? Oh yeah, defending McCain….be still my stomach.  I\’m afraid I have to give McCain the benefit of the doubt here.  He\’s dense and he\’s stubborn but even he has his limits, and conditions have changed drastically along our southern border.   So much so, that even McCain can no longer ignore it and the wishes of his constituents.  It\’s actually summed up pretty well in a recent letter to The Corner.

As someone who has lived in Tucson, AZ since 1972, I don\’t think you all back east understand how much things have changed down here in the last few years. This is not the same border we were protecting just a few years ago. The difference is the Mexican drug cartels and the war that is going on down there between them and the Mexican government and among themselves. Just last week, three of the cartels joined together to try to take out the Zetas, a sort of rogue group responsible for all sorts of horrible things. We have never had a rancher murdered before Mr. Krentz two weeks ago.

We\’re rapidly losing control down there, and there is very little stopping the cartel wars from spilling across the border and we start seeing non-corrupt police officers gunned down.  Our resources are stretched thin and there is very little on deck to help them out in the near future.  The Secure Border Initiative project by the Department of Homeland Security, to use technology instead of a proven fence to secure our borders was a craptastically miserable failure and has since been abandoned.  That means nothing new is coming online any time soon to help.

So I\’m not going to criticize McCain on finally coming around on this issue.  That said, his inability to see this coming years in advance demonstrates a horrifying lack of awareness and horrible judgment.  And his enthusiasm for demagoguery of his opponents on this very issue has earned him no good will.  So I would shed no tear if he was defeated for his seat, especially if it\’s taken by someone that didn\’t have to come around on this issue years too late to do anything about it.

Sorry, McCain, I\’m glad you\’ve finally seen the light at the end of the tunnel, but unfortunately that light is a train.

[Crossposted at True North]

I haven\’t written on the immigration issue for awhile because quite frankly most of Washington has had enough of the issue, as the debate of 2007 was a disaster nobody wants to repeat.  Well nobody except for President Disaster himself.

The Obama administration will insist on measures to give legal status to an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants as it pushes early next year for legislation to overhaul the immigration system, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on Friday.

When I hear this I think back on the snarky insult \”When last I saw you, you had hit rock bottom.  I see you\’ve begun to dig\”.  This is an issue that nobody is excited to see come up and even fewer are likely to support.  For one none of the Republicans in Congress will feel pressured to support it now that it\’s not Bush pushing the issue.

What\’s more, even when it was Bush pushing the issue there were Democrats that didn\’t want to move forward with amnesty.  With Obama\’s magic haven\’t lost it\’s shine, there is little motivation for Democrats to attempt to cling to his shrinking coattails.  Plus with a flagging economy and unemployment in the double digits, Congress trying to force through amnesty for millions of illegal will be even less popular with the public than health care.  And taking place less than ten months from an election, there is little to no time for that hostility to wear off.  Democrats aren\’t going to be much in a mood to entertain a pariah such as amnesty.

Laying out the administration’s bottom line, Ms. Napolitano said officials would argue for a “three-legged stool” that includes tougher enforcement laws against illegal immigrants and employers who hire them and a streamlined system for legal immigration, as well as a “tough and fair pathway to earned legal status.”

Problem is that this is little different than what Bush was pushing and as I mentioned, conditions have not improved.  In fact they\’ve worsened greatly.  We\’ve been promised enforcement before but all we got was amnesty.  And there is no reason why enforcement can\’t be passed separately from amnesty.  Well no reason other than it has no chance of passing.  Especially when the need for cheap labor is hardly going to fly in the face of double digit unemployment.

Speaking at the Center for American Progress, a liberal policy group in Washington, Ms. Napolitano unveiled a double-barrel argument for a legalization program, saying it would enhance national security and, as the economy climbs out of recession, protect American workers from unfair competition from lower-paid, easily exploited illegal immigrants.

If the motivation is truly to protect the American worker, introduce millions of people competing from the same scarce jobs is hardly the way to do it.  A better way would be to simply improve enforcement measures and increase penalties for employers that employ illegals.  Of course, the Obama Administration is going to try to play that card.

Drawing a contrast with 2007, when a bill with legalization provisions offered by President George W. Bush failed in Congress, Ms. Napolitano said the Obama administration had achieved a “fundamental change” in border security and enforcement against employers hiring illegal immigrants. She said a sharp reduction in the flow of illegal immigrants into the country created an opportunity to move ahead with a legalization program.

The sharp reduction in illegal is due to the economy not any sort of enforcement.  While we have hired quite a number of new border control agents it\’s still a hell of a big border.  And the Obama Administration, or the Bush administration for that matter, can talk all they want fencing they\’ve built.  It doesn\’t change the fact that most of that fencing is simple string fencing of the type you see dividing fields in your average rural Midwestern farm, hardly suitable for a national border.

Sorry Obama and Napolitano, like most of your other endeavors, this is a disaster in the making.  Which isn\’t to say we don\’t need to be vigilant.  If you\’ve proven one thing it\’s your determination to force through your agenda no matter how much the public opposes it.  So while this is likely to end in utter failure, it\’s also going to require great effort to defeat once again.  Although some of the opposition writes itself, as noted by Capt Ed….

Are Democrats really more interested in enforcing criminal penalties for unconstitutional mandates to buy insurance than they are in enforcing legitimate immigration laws?  Because that’s what Napolitano suggests in her political prognostication.  You can bet that those mandates and their enforcement will form a core argument from Republicans against a push for amnesty

In truth I suspect this is more Obama\’s attempt to placate some of his supporters.  Obama made an awful lot of promises during his campaign.  He\’s going to have to at least attempt to accomplish some of them, or he may find himself standing alone amongst a see of enemies.

An important milestone for E-Verify is on the horizon, as it may soon be required for all federal contractors.  Before Bush left office he instated regulations for federal contractors requiring them to use E-Verify when hiring employees.  The US Chamber of Commerce immediately appealed the regulation in court and it\’s been tied up in court ever since.  Obama has repeatedly taken the easy way out and delayed the implementation of the regulation with the excuse that it was out of his hands, it\’s up to the courts.

Now the courts have ruled that the US Chamber of Commerce is smoking some serious dope and have throw out their case.  The way is open and clear for the E-Verify regulation to be implemented.  And coincidentally the last time Obama delayed it he delayed it until September 8th.  Within the next week Obama has to decide if he\’s going to implement the regulation or else find another excuse to avoid it.  Compared to the health care debate, this is relatively small potatoes but it could signal quite a bit about how vulnerable Obama is feeling.

If there is one thing that Obama does better than Bush did, it\’s piloting his public approval ratings straight into the ground Hindenburg style.  Until recently it was simply the shine coming off that rose.  Now the game is a little different, in much the same way it was for Bush.  Bush, while rabidly unpopular with the left and soon the center, retained the loyalty of the right until around late 2005/early 2006.  Then you started seeing his approval drop even further as even Republicans expressed disapproval.

Now his approval rate has dropped that further drops indicate that even Democrats are abandoning him, and the latest Zogby poll indicates that\’s exactly what\’s happening.  Democrats are frustrated with the lack of progress and the inept manner in which this administration has behaved so far.  This is obviously a path which can\’t be sustained if Obama intends to accomplish anything in his term, much less win re-election.  As much as he likes to pretend to be above it, he realizes this better than anyone.

So what are his options?  After all the right always disliked him.  The center is realizing they were had on Election Day and elected an ultra-liberal who taxes and spends impulsively.   The left oddly enough is mad because Obama hasn\’t governed left enough.  Essentially the amazing spectacle that his campaign was is coming back to haunt him.  Everyone was promised the moon and they got a few crumbs of extremely moldy cheese.

So what\’s this got to do with E-Verify?? Well Obama is going to toss the left a few token measures and hope that satisfies them for now.  He can\’t move to the left any more on any of the high visibility stuff.  The public is just too wound up over this health care issue.  E-Verify is a relatively low profile (to non-politicos) that could give him some credibility with the left.  It also gives him the chance to get a waiver on bringing up the immigration issue again, which nobody left of McCain wants to see brought up again.

While it would be great to see E-Verify required for federal contractors, this is destined to be the sacrificial lamb on the alter of Obama.  Even Messiahs, it seems, must pay homage.

[Crossposted at True North]

Well, on immigration there is good news and bad news.

The good news is that all four border enforcement amendments passed in the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2010 (HR 2892).  If your really want to know more about the specific amendments, you can find more information here.  Suffice to say they were all critically important for enforcing our immigration laws and protecting our borders.  Each one added a critical tool in that effort.

Bad news is the fight is not over.  The Senate and House bills differ greatly and they will have to be reconciled in a Conference Committee.  That\’s where things get tricky.  Several of these amendments has been passed before, but then have been stripped out in backroom deals during Conference Committees.  In fact, back in February President Obama, Speaker Pelosi and Senate Leader Reid all worked to remove several of these provisions from the porkulus legislation, thereby ensuring that Porkulus didn\’t have a single item worth a damn in it.

We have to make sure these three bumbling idiots don\’t do it again.  In our favor is the fact that three of these amendments were passed by voice vote, which generally means they weren\’t greatly contested, and in procedural motions and the vote on the fourth amendment, they passed overwhelmingly, which included the support of a number of Democrats.

Contact your Legislators (House and Senate) and let them know they need to keep the E-Verify, Fence and No-Match related amendments in the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2010 (HR 2892).