Ted Kennedy joins forces with George W. Bush?
Rush Limbaugh agrees with the AFL-CIO?
If the political world has come unhinged over Immigration Reform, one thing remains constant, Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., is still against it.
This week on This Week with George Stephanopoulos, Sen. Kennedy and Sen. Sessions gave competing arguments over a new push in Congress (as opposed to the old push about three weeks ago) for/against Immigration Reform.
Neither senator dug deep into the specifics of the legislation, and in fact it seemed they were talking about two different bills. Kennedy said the bill would fund border security, enact workplace enforcement and draw the illegal immigrants out of the shadows. Sessions said the bill brings us to the “brink of amnesty” and would not achieve any of those goals because … well, it’s just a bad bill and we need a national “mindset change,” whatever that means.
Sessions went on to argue that an immigrant ID card would not ensure accuracy, as immigrants could just give a false name — this opposed to the way we used to do things, where we gave Immigrants their false names when they got to Ellis Island.
Stephanopoulos played a clip of Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-Fla., arguing that resistance to immigration reform was simply politicized xenophobia (hatin’ on people who aren’t from around here): Instead of “Irish need not apply” signs, we would now have “Mexicans need not apply” signs. Sessions said Graham’s argument just wasn’t true. (Both senators seemed to have missed the point altogether. Indeed, Mexicans on pickup corners need not apply, just get in the back of the truck — that’s the job interview.)
At least Sessions did not go off the deep end, as did Pat Buchanan on Meet the Press. Graham may claim that brown is the new black, but not if Buchanan has anything to do with it. On this morning’s show, Buchanan argued (for real and for true) that we don’t need illegal immigrants here doing low-paying, low-skilled manual labor when we already have so many uneducated illiterate black people capable of doing the same things. Buchanan is the recent author of a book called State of Emergency: The Third World Invasion and Conquest of America. Apparently “Rebirth of a Nation” was already taken.
Regardless, Buchanan can make noise, but Sessions can make trouble for the president and the bill. While Sessions has supported most of Bush’s policies, especially the war in Iraq, he has been on constant antagonist to the president on immigration reform. Even still, Bush appeared with Sessions in Mobile last week to raise money for the senator’s reelection campaign. That $1,000-per-ticket event netted Sessions at least $900,000, bringing his total campaign coffers to almost $3 million.
It’s not clear whether an Alabama Democrat will pose a serious challenge to Sessions. Earlier this month, one rumored candidate, Agriculture and Industries Commissioner Ron Sparks, said he would not run for the Senate seat. Instead, Alabama Democrats are stuck with State Sen. Vivian Figures, D-Mobile. Don’t know who she is? Don’t worry. If the conventional wisdom holds true, you never will.
On the program Sunday, Sessions addressed the Iraq Problem, saying again that the war could not go on indefinitely and that September could be the moment of truth. Last month, Sessions made news on Face the Nation, when he said Senate Republicans would not likely support the war after Gen. David Petraeus gives his report to Congress this fall.
“In the end, we will have to ask our selves what do we do and reduce our presence in Iraq,” Sessions said Sunday.
Sessions said he supports a “politically driven timetable,” and if that sounds like a timetable, deadline or benchmarks, well …
— Kyle Whitmire
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Popularity: 6% [?]
June 24th, 2007 at 12:51 pm
No ammnesty. This sham of a bill is being proposed by out of touch elites that have NO IDEA what is really going on in the country. I live in Southern California, and it is turning into MEXICO. The schools are failing, teenage mexican girls pregnant, teenage mexican boys drop out. The language spoken in the stores is spanish, and white people are leaving fast. The problem is.. there will soon be no where to go…
June 24th, 2007 at 7:13 pm
The problem is two headed but far more significant than who is entering is what they do when they are here. The failure to encourage cultural and linguistic assimilation is far worse.
June 24th, 2007 at 8:06 pm
Bring back operation Wetback.Enforce the current laws. Deport all illegals now…..
June 25th, 2007 at 12:17 am
Ted Kennedy was a strong supporter of the 1965 Hart-Celler Act signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson which dramatically changed US immigration policy.
This is what Ted Kennedy said about the 1965 bill.
“The bill will not flood our cities with immigrants. It will not upset the ethnic mix of our society. It will not relax the standards of admission. It will not cause American workers to lose their jobs.”
Kennedy is now the chair of the United States Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Citizenship, and remains a strong advocate for immigrants, both documented and undocumented
About the same time, there wasn’t enough room for citizens to have children.
Back in the 60’s the Federal Government came into the public schools and brainwashed us as little children with the message that the children we were about to have were unwanted because the population was rising so fast. They launched a program called, “Zero Population Growth”. They pushed Family Planning and birth control pills. I think you and I now both know that you only have to trick people for their few child bearing years and there is no going back.
Many of us never had a say in the future of our unborn.
I am the result of two living cells. One from each of my parents. They are the result of two living cells, one from each of their parents. I wasn’t just born. I am a continuation of life. I am a living thing that reaches back into time perhaps 400 million years and the result of billions of joining of pairs of cells. It is possible that if you were to follow my cells back to my parent’s cells and beyond that my family tree touches every living thing here on earth. That is if we limit ourselves to believing life was created here on earth. If it rained down from the immensity of the universe it could reach back into that immensity of time and space, and who knows what relationships and who knows what species.
At least until I came up against the Federal Government and their plan to control the population.
I have seen the Federal Government do little else to control the population.
The open border, United States laws only apply to some, is a serious slap in the face. No, not a slap in the face, it reaches well beyond that. Maybe back to the beginning of time and stretch to the bounds of the universe.
June 25th, 2007 at 4:14 am
Sessions’ racism is disturbing.
The haters offer no realistic solution to the problem. The next person who says: Deport Them, should be send back in time to Nazi Germany.
Stop the hatred and solve the problem NOW before it gets any worse in 2-3 years.
Further, millions of hard-working men and women deserve a chance at the American dream.