Posted on 05/17/2008 6:47:22 AM PDT by kellynla
There is an unwritten rule in Congress that the appropriations process should not be used to pass major legislation. So when the Senate Appropriations Committee makes an exception to this rule, you can bet that they are doing so only to deal with some burning crisis.
For the Senate Appropriations Committee to break with tradition, the interests at stake must be so compelling that circumstances demand that the cumbersome legislative process be bypassed and that the issue be dealt with immediately. And when the legislation gets tacked on to not just any old appropriations bill, but an emergency supplemental appropriations bill to fund our servicemen and women fighting in Iraq, one can assume that the most vital national interests hang in the balance.
What were the compelling interests that led the august Senate Appropriations Committee to include major legislation as part of the military spending bill on Thursday? Amnesty for illegal aliens, and lots of new foreign workers for powerful business interests.
In one afternoon, the Appropriations Committee approved amnesty for 1.35 million illegal alien agricultural workers, and made available an additional 650,000 skilled and unskilled foreign guest workers over the next three years. That’s 2 million new, or newly legalized, foreign workers entering our labor force over the next three years – even as our economy has been losing jobs.
The 2 million figure does not include the dependents of the amnesty recipients or new workers who could be admitted under existing agricultural guest worker programs. Under the agricultural amnesty – written by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) at the behest of the California agricultural lobby – the spouses of amnesty recipients will also be authorized to compete with American workers for jobs in any sector of our labor market. Nor does it include the potentially unlimited number of new guest workers agricultural employers will be able to import under a “streamlined” H-2A program that requires the Department of Labor to issue visas within seven days of an employer’s request.
Just to be extra sure that the agriculture industry will get their workers as cheaply as possible, Sen. Feinstein threw in a provision that freezes wages for these farm workers at 2007 levels.
While the Feinstein amendment offers senators a fig leaf to avoid the dreaded “A-Word” (that’s A-M-N-E-S-T-Y) by legalizing these workers for only five years, the sunset provision is sheer kabuki theater. Everyone knows that once we start down that road there is no turning back. At some point in the next five years, the “temporary” amnesty will be made a permanent one and will likely include many other categories of illegal aliens – just to be fair to everyone who broke our laws.
California agriculture is not the only business interest powerful enough to hitch a ride on the backs of our military personnel. The Maryland fishing and tourism industries also want a ready supply of cheap foreign labor, and Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) was happy to accommodate by offering an amendment that exempts returning unskilled or low-skilled H-2B workers from counting against the caps for that category. (Never mind that there are fewer Maryland crabs to harvest each year, and that with the skyrocketing price of gas people may not be able to afford to drive to the Eastern Shore.) Over the next three years, the cumulative number of H-2B workers admitted could reach 432,000.
And while the Appropriations Committee was piling on goodies for the low-skill industries, they found time to take care of the lobbyists for the high tech industry as well. Sen. Patty Murray (D-Microsoft/Wash.) added a provision to “recapture” 218,000 visas for skilled foreign workers. These visas didn’t really “escape,” so much as they just went unutilized between 1996 and 2004, especially during the years immediately after the high tech bubble burst. But now high tech employers and labor contractors want those visas back, because foreign guest workers tamp down labor costs for the industry.
Americans, no matter what they might think of the war in Iraq, genuinely support our men and women who are over there serving our nation. It seems that the members of the Senate Appropriations Committee love our troops too – but for entirely different reasons: they provide convenient cover for passing special interest legislation to benefit illegal aliens and powerful business lobbies.
Our government is killing this country.
“Our government is killing this country.”
nothing that can’t be fixed...
we just need more conservatives to “step up to the plate” and start running for local, state and federal elective offices if we are ever going to turn this mess around; especially governorships, so that we have a better field of candidates to choose from to run for POTUS!
And we all need to do all we can to encourage & support those people!!!
too late
I think the problem is that true conservatives are too honest to be successful at running for office. It requires lots of money and groveling for political donations from strangers just isn’t my style. Making false promises to the audience would leave me feeling empty.
____________________________________________________________________________
Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them.
Have you ever wondered why, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, we have deficits?
Have you ever wondered why, if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, we have inflation and high taxes?
You and I don’t propose a federal budget. The president does.
You and I don’t have the Constitutional authority to vote on
appropriations. The House of Representatives does.
You and I don’t write the tax code, Congress does.
You and I don’t set fiscal policy, Congress does.
You and I don’t control monetary policy, The Federal Reserve Bank does.
One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one president and nine Supreme Court justices - 545 human beings out of the 300 million - are directly, legally, morally and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague this country.
I excluded the members of the Federal Reserve Board because that problem was created by the Congress.
In 1913, Congress delegated its Constitutional duty to provide a sound currency to a federally chartered but private central bank.
I excluded all the special interests and lobbyists for a sound reason.
They have no legal authority.
They have no ability to coerce a senator, a congressman or a president to do one cotton-picking thing.
I don’t care if they offer a politician $1 million dollars in cash. The politician has the power to accept or reject it. No matter what the lobbyist promises, it is the legislator’s responsibility to determine how he votes.
Those 545 human beings spend much of their energy convincing you that what they did is not their fault. They cooperate in this common con regardless of party.
What separates a politician from a normal human being is an excessive amount of gall.
No normal human being would have the gall of a Speaker, who stood up and criticized the President for creating deficits.
The president can only propose a budget.
He cannot force the Congress to accept it.
The Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land, gives sole responsibility to the House of Representatives for originating and approving appropriations and taxes.
Who is the speaker of the House?
She is the leader of the majority party.
She and fellow House members, not the president, can approve any budget they want.
If the president vetoes it, they can pass it over his veto if they agree to.
It seems inconceivable to me that a nation of 300 million can not replace 545 people who stand convicted — by present facts - of incompetence and irresponsibility.
I can’t think of a single domestic problem that is not traceable directly to those 545 people.
When you fully grasp the plain truth that 545 people exercise the power of the federal government, then it must follow that what exists is what they want to exist.
If the tax code is unfair, it’s because they want it unfair.
If the budget is in the red, it’s because they want it in the red.
If the Marines are in Iraq , it’s because they want them in Iraq .
If they do not receive social security but are on an elite retirement plan not available to the people, it’s because they want it that way.
There are no insoluble government problems.
Do not let these 545 people shift the blame to bureaucrats, whom they hire and whose jobs they can abolish; to lobbyists, whose gifts and advice they can reject; to regulators, to whom they give the power to regulate and from whom they can take this power.
Above all, do not let them con you into the belief that there exists disembodied mystical forces like ‘the economy,’ ‘inflation’ or ‘politics’ that prevent them from doing what they take an oath to do.
Those 545 people, and they alone, are responsible.
They, and they alone, have the power.
They, and they alone, should be held accountable by the people who are their bosses - provided the voters have the gumption to manage their own employees.
We should vote all of them out of office and clean up their mess!
Charlie Reese is a former columnist
of the Orlando Sentinel Newspaper
Thus the reason the President needs to have the Line Item VETO. This is no different than pet pork projects. Pack in unrelated trash to “must-pass” legislation to get your junk into play.
Anyone republican are demorat that votes for this and claims they are not voting for amnesty are nothing but out right liars.
What does Congress have to do with the American people? Nothing!
“In one afternoon, the Appropriations Committee approved amnesty for 1.35 million illegal alien agricultural workers, and made available an additional 650,000 skilled and unskilled foreign guest workers over the next three years. That’s 2 million new, or newly legalized, foreign workers entering our labor force over the next three years – even as our economy has been losing jobs.”
An accomplished fact? Fait accompli? Am I losing my mind, or do I understand this right? That is enough morons to insure a permanent Democrat majority. They quietly killed this country in one afternoon unbeknownst to the general public?
btt
The Real ID Act was passed as an amendment to the defense supplemental spending bill in 2005.
One question: was the Real ID Act opposed so overwhelmingly by the American people as amnesty was last year? Did they shut the phone lines down in Washington in their demands that it not pass?
These scamnesty bills cannot stand on their own so they have to sneak them in on an appropriations bill during the dead of the night and on a Friday when there's little expected media coverage. That's pretty sleazy, even for the democrats.
Amnesty passed last year. The bill was killed because a few pubs, who couldn't stop amnesty, joined the union to sunset the guestworker program.
It is all political theater.
They can't implement amnesty until they implement Real ID and Real ID has been delayed.
As for the Feinstein amendment, that was not a secret. Can you imagine the United Farm Workers being the labor contractor. And the AFL-CIO affiliate in Mexico passing out the visas.
If that were the reason for killing amnesty last year then why so be secretive about it this year? And yes they are attempting to do this in a sneaky, underhanded way instead of in the open sunshine where the bill is introduced as a standalone and debated on its own merits.
They can't implement amnesty until they implement Real ID and Real ID has been delayed.
Your argument about Real ID also falls flat because it's not fully implemented yet so why amnesty now then, why not wait?
The bottom line is the bathroom tap dancer from Idaho and his liberal drama queen sidekick from San Francisco are determined to flood us with cheap labor non-stop. But J Sessions and co. are on the case...
Having said that, it is really just campaign strategy. As you said, Sessions is on the case. It won't pass. But, in the process of defeating it, the GOP will come off as strident and overreaching.
The defeat of the amendment will serve two strategic purposes for the dems.
First, it will exacerbate the ill will between agribusiness and the GOP.
Second, it furthers the split between the GOP inland west and the GOP South(Sessions and his Southern Immigration Caucus). Especially AZ and CO. Their get tuff on illegals policies have created severe problems in ag labor and both legislatures are trying to get something set up on guest workers. The AZ employer sanctions law, which was supposed to be implemented last Jan, has been on hold. They passed more legislation a couple of weeks ago to water it down.
Overreaching to whom, the cheap labor lobbies who want a never ending supply of it at everyone's expense?
Read what Sessions is saying, he's not against a genuine temporary guest worker program where they actually work here temporarily then go home. I think you'll find that's how most Americans feel. The GOP has no choice but to fight future amnesty attempts because they won't be getting any votes from those allowed to stay permanently.
You claim to be conservative yet you don't recognize that? You should get behind Sessions and the others in the GOP who want true immigration reform, not the kind that benefits one party or a few special interests.
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