Last night, it appears that immigration reform collapsed in the U.S. Senate. This was far from a perfect bill, but it was at least a bipartisan attempt to deal with a completely dysfunctional immigration system. As Dan Balz writes in this morning's Washington Post, the immigration bill's collapse represents "A Failure of Leadership in a Flawed Political Culture" and "a scathing indictment of the political culture of Washington."
The defeat of the legislation can be laid at the doorstep of opponents on the right and left, on congressional leaders who couldn't move their troops and on an increasingly weakened president and his White House team. But together it added up to another example of a polarized political system in which the center could not hold.
Very true. What we have seen in recent weeks is a full-fledged assault on this (admittedly) imperfect immigration bill by both the "deport 'em all" as well as the "give 'em all citizenship" factions. The perfect became the enemy of the (pretty) good in this case. What does this bode for the future? Balz writes:
If Washington cannot produce a solution to the glaring problem of immigration, they will ask, what hope is there for progress on health care, energy independence, or the financial challenges facing Medicare and Social Security? Iraq is another matter entirely.
Yeah, good luck solving THOSE issues if we can't make any progress on immmgration. Damn.
What are the potential political implications? According to Balz, "The collective failure of the two parties already appears to have stimulated interest in a third-party candidate for president in 2008 whose main promise would be to make Washington work." Will we have another Ross Perot-style run by a billionaire this year, as we did in 1992? Could New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (or somebody else) be any more successful than Perot, who received nearly 19% of the vote in 1992? In sum, is the time ripe for the vast center of America to rise up against the ideological extremes and special interests and to take back their country? I'm up for it, are you?
?Tonight I voted with a majority of the Senate to shelve the immigration reform bill. I did so because significant improvements are still required in order to ensure the practicality and fairness of our immigration system.?Our immigration policy desperately needs a fix. I regret that the Senate was unable to find a common sense middle ground that recognizes the contributions of immigrants to our society but also protects America?s workers and respects the rule of law.
?I introduced exactly such an amendment this week which sought to create a fair and workable path to legalization for those who have truly put down roots in this country, while protecting the American workforce.
?As I?ve said many times on the Senate floor, I believe my amendment held the promise of uniting the extremes and finding a solid middle ground on which to base meaningful immigration reform.
?Until we succeed, I call on the President to vigorously enforce the laws that are on the books. This includes tough civil and criminal penalties for companies that knowingly hire illegal immigrants. We must also gain control over our porous borders by properly utilizing the assets and legal means now at our disposal. We have these laws and these means. The President needs to enforce them.
?Senator Reid has indicated that he plans to bring immigration legislation back to the Senate Floor for debate. I hope he does so. And when he does, I will work with him to make sure we find a fair and workable policy. For the good of this country, it is important that we do so.?
I hope Sen. Webb is right, that immigration reform is not dead for 2007. If not now, when? If not this Congress, who?
Then of course you have those opposed to immigration entirely where any bill would be unacceptable.
And finally the pro-illegal alien lobby who wanted another 1986 style amnesty.
I believe we could have had a "Jim Webb" styled compromise. But this bill was poison from the beginning. No number of amendments would fix the fundamentally flawed bill.
My advice: try again! This issue is too important to give up on.
For legitimacy to the process a candidate must emerge from the left and the right to balance vote taking from the Republican or Democratic parties.
The Republican and Democratic parties only uniting issue is to fight against thrid parties because it violates the ingrained power structure machine all the way from party bosses down to members of the young democrats and republicans
Obama and McCain (along with potentailly other candidates)both have potential to appeal to the center but in an attempt to win their respective primaries and raise money they must appeal to their respective base first.
Blogs could seriously influence the outreach efforts of a third party candidate and could potentially raise cash and influence voters to provide legitimacy to the process. For this to work, a single third party candidate needs to be chosen which as stated above will be difficult since at least one major party will be fighting against it to avoid siphoning off of voters.
Finally if you haven't already check out Unity 08
Have a great weekend
In 1992 Perot did pull in a decent number of votes (19%). And, quite frankly, he was a loon. Which is probably why he never seriously challenged the established two parties.
Jesse Ventura did win in Minnesota as an outsider.
It could happen. Question is, is there a rich, sane, educated, experienced, independent minded, non-party-affiliated person who is willing to take on a Presidential campaign? That's a very tall order.
Gridlock is not so bad for a year or two. At least the excesses of the Republican regime have been stopped.
Many businesses have gotten spoiled with access to cheap labor. One farmer doesn't have to buy a tractor because he can hire undocumented labor so he runs his neighbor out of business. One resturant can cut costs because he pays his cooks and dishwashers under the table and runs the his neighbor out of business. The remaining neighboring businesses catch on and do the same thing. It's a downward spiral. Eventually they hire lobbyists to give them more access to cheap labor. The practice spreads to health care and software industries, except the labor is non-immigrant guest workers. More lobbyists scream for more special programs.
The middle class looks on goes "wtf?". A country that 40 years ago had a modest immigration program that welcomed people through the front door and provided a simple track to citizenship has turned into a maze of massive subsidies that only the business extremes and race-based ethnocentric groups could love.
Yes, McMansions are cheaper to build but can real Americans afford them?
The bill dealt with issues that should each be dealt independently. Illegal immigration from Mexico and Central America has a different context than H-B1 visas. And these are different from border security. And these are different from criteria for allowing legal immigration.
Rolling them into one big bill meant that everyone would be unhappy--that is, everyone except for corporations, who seemed to have ended on the winning side of each of these issues. They kept their low-wage illegal immigration workforce, they expanded the employer-sponsor programs, and changed the immigration criteria to push up to the line potential cheaper qualified labor.
"Comprehensive" immigration reform is code word for the Corporate cheap labor lobby and does need to be abandoned as long as they continue down this path you'll see 26% support and outrage from the American people because more immigration, preferred legalization and zero employer punishment is not what they want...
I believe punish employers was a major campaign promise and polls about 80% for.