What to make of this?Q: With more Democrats in the Senate and the House and a Democrat in the White House, how do you see congressional efforts playing out on such issues as health care and immigration?
A: On immigration, there's been an agreement between (President-elect Barack) Obama and (Arizona Republican Sen. John) McCain to move forward on that. ... We'll do that. We have to get this economy stuff figured out first, so I think we'll have a shot at doing something on health care in the next Congress for sure.
Q: Will there be as much of a fight on immigration as last time?
A: We've got McCain and we've got a few others. I don't expect much of a fight at all. Now health care is going to be difficult. That's a very complicated issue. We debated at great length immigration. People understand the issues very well. We have not debated health care, so that's going to take a lot more time to do
- A couple of years ago, a technician who deals with Senators daily told me Reid is pretty ga-ga most of the time, perhaps from his amateur boxing days, so he may be just rambling. But everybody else seems to think he's totally on top of the things, so what do I know?
- Or, it's true. If so, why would Obama and the Democrats want to walk into their Stalingrad, trying to shove amnesty through in the teeth of unemployment rocketing upwards? If Bush couldn't pass it during the phony prosperity of the Housing Bubble, how is going to pass during the Crash? And as a higher priority than health care? Are they nuts?
Well, one possibility is that the Democrats don't get how the politics of economic collapse work when it comes to immigration. It's not as if they've allowed themselves a free, wide-ranging, penetrating debate on the subject of immigration. Most Democrats are superstitious ignoramuses on the topic, intellectually emasculated by political correctness.
Another possibility is that far-seeing Democrats are thinking: Now or Never for amnesty. They've been saying for years: "You can't deport 12 million people." Well, unless the U.S. government does something quick to stop the illegal aliens from leaving, quite a few million illegals are going to self-deport themselves over the next few years because it's a lot cheaper to be unemployed in sunny Mexico than in, say, Denver.
A few sharp cookies on the Democratic side may realize they'll be waving adios to part of their Permanent Majority unless they "put them on a path to citizenship" early in 2009 while the media's chant of "Obey Giant Obama" hasn't yet worn thin and before the public has a chance to realize just how deep this recession will be. Then the illegals will be free to go home but they'll also be free to come back to the U.S. legally when the economy picks up in 2015 or whenever. But if they vamoose before the Democrats get a chance to put them on the path to citizenship, then, when the Border Wall and E-Verify are finally working, the Democrats could find themselves bereft of millions of votes a couple of decades down the road. So, Obama has to work his bipartisan magic with McCain NOW. The media will wet themselves with delight in forgiving McCain for his rampant racism in putting up token opposition to The One.
My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer
I think your second possibility is more plausible. If they pursue amnesty, Democrats will be walking into controversy when they were hoping to unite the country, but it's probably worth it to add millions of Democratic voters to the electorate.
ReplyDeleteIf they push for amnesty, they will get it. They barely failed in 2007 and several Republican stalwarts who stopped it will be gone soon, mostly replaced by Democrats.
If history is any guide, the party with the big majority is likely to lose seats in the midterm elections. So they're better off to push their "change" while they have a majority. Think about the 1964-1966 Democratic supermajority period - they overreached and lost bigtime in 1966, but they also advanced leftist causes in a big way, and the subsequent backlash only slowed down their advances, it didn't actually reverse them,
"...when the Border Wall and E-Verify are finally working..."
ReplyDeleteLOL!!
Nice one.
You're kidding, right?
Looks like we may have a fight on our hands!
ReplyDeletewww.numbersusa.com
This could also be nothing more than a head fake; they don't intend to do anything but have to at least pay lip service to the Maldef and La Raza factions that are noisily insisting that they gave Obama his margin of victory.
ReplyDeleteUnless I am very much mistaken, George Bush's approval numbers were hovering around 40% before he tried to foist amnesty on the public not once, but twice. After that debacle, his ratings sunk into the 25-30% range, never to recover.
Obama is not a stupid man, and neither is his chief of staff, Emmanuel. They probably see this issue is radioactive and aren't about to touch it.
The only circumstance I can see where they might try to pull this off is they figure the economy is such a dominant news story that this could be slipped through under cover of the night, with a compliant media essentially doing a "news blackout" and not reporting on it until the day Obama signs the bill.
If they pass immigration amnesty now, when there aren't so many jobs for immigrants, the expected flood of immigrants won't happen right away, and they can crow that the doomsayers' predictions were disproven. If the flood of immigrants starts back up in 2010, they'll say it's due to the strengthening economy, and that just proves that it's impossible to actually control the border.
ReplyDeleteI fear that Steve is calling this one right. It would really ice the cake for Ted Kennedy to die. Not that this hasn't been written before. I just shows how much more saccharine can be poured into the MSM public opinion generating, magic machine that's cheerfully cutting our throats. Needless to say, anti-amnesty efforts should be proactive. Voice your concern early and often and put your elected representatives on notice that amnesty = defeat in the next election.
ReplyDeleteAs a left-wing nationalist who supports Obama on most issues but realizes the Democrats are out to lunch on the subject of immigration (to the detriment of working class US citizens), I'm counting on you guys to make amnesty dead on arrival. Amnesty is something with almost no support outside the elites of both parties, and hopefully the Congress will realize that.
ReplyDelete"We have to get this economy stuff figured out first"
ReplyDeleteYea, Reid sure sounds like he even knows what an economy is. Never mind fixing it. But what the heck. Just let in another 40 mio. plebs and somehow things will just improve. Sure shows the level of Intellekt in the Senate.
Who says Obama wants amnesty? More hispanics --> less black power. And if, per Steve, Obama is all about black power, he would talk tough on amnesty and then let it go nowhere.
ReplyDeleteSteve wrote:
ReplyDelete..."unless the U.S. government does something quick to stop the illegal aliens from leaving, quite a few million illegals are going to self-deport themselves over the next few years because it's a lot cheaper to be unemployed in sunny Mexico than in, say, Denver."
That is literally picking "other" people from somewhere else over the economic proseperity of Americans who have lineages here that stretch back hundreds of years for purported political advantage via demography later. Its so disgusting that words fail me. We are IN A RECESSION. We may see one or two million people lose their jobs and REALLY struggle. Look what they (the Dems and open-borders Republicans) are worried about: cheap labor and votes.
Could the disconnect between our rulers and us be any more gaping a chasm?
By The Way: If Yosemitie McCain is the point man on this, much of the base will --really-- know just how much this man hates their guts.
If Yosemitie McCain is the point man on this, much of the base will --really-- know just how much this man hates their guts.
ReplyDeleteThe feeling is mutual.
Aren't you pleased that he lost the election? I sure am.
Obama figures Media worship of him as their Living God will let him get away with this. And yes, he hates Whites enough to dilute Black voting/demographic power.
ReplyDeleteRead his book.
It is of course a gift to Republicans, who can then unite around that coastal elite project to replace White working class voters with Mexican ones. In a recession. That's a gift, and one that can be pushed HARD. Particularly in a "betrayal" theme with McCain linked up to Obama as the "betrayer" or double-crosser and Palin, Rudy, Romney competing to dress up their working-man creds.
Add in a good dose of economic protectionism, note how Democrats hate Detroit so much they want it to die while bailing out Citi, AIG, etc. and a few terrorist attacks ala Bombay today that Obama just sits back and apologizes (to the terrorists, playing out his anti-American instincts) and it's a huge sell to tell the working class White vote they made a HUGE mistake.
Dems always lose when they are too coastal elite. Because there are not that many coastal elites.
"Anonymous said...
ReplyDeleteBy The Way: If Yosemitie McCain is the point man on this, much of the base will --really-- know just how much this man hates their guts."
He will be, and he does. I've sometimes wondered if McCain perhaps didn't have his own "God Damn America" moment when he was rotting in the Hanoi Hilton. Maybe he blames America for his captivity, and his recent actions are just payback. Cheap psychologizing, I know, and probably not worth a damn. I'm sure there are those who would call it a cheap shot too. I don't care. John McCain acts as if he hates me, so I'll just hate him right back.
They'll get their amnesty, no question. Even if they somehow don't get it this time, they'll just keeping voting on it each year until it passes.
ReplyDeletePractice your Spanish, and make damn sure your kids are fluent, because it's the language of the future.
Amnesty was always part of the Grand Plan. Did anyone really think the Dems would start their 'Great Deal' without securing their power base first? They'd be risking everything, and there's no reason to do that when they have the power to secure themselves for the foreseeable future. Amnesty is a key part of their plan and will be instituted in the first year. They will also likely use the housing crises to shuffle immigrants to red districts and states as well (after all, they own the mortgages now). By 2010 everything will be in place to seal the deal with redistricting. Game over.
ReplyDeleteWhile Obama's ideology is more anti-white than pro-black, I very much doubt that he has Bush or McCain's visceral commitment to Hispanics, and thus to amnesty. So I doubt he'll risk much political capital on pushing it through.
ReplyDeleteIn case of a major terrorist attack, Obama, unlike Bush, will give an uplifting speech that rallies national support - that's his forte. He certainly won't 'apologise to the terrorists'. On-the-ground actions may not differ much from Bush-McCain, except that he's unlikely to use an Al Qaeda attack as an excuse to attack Iran. He'll almost certainly continue the policies of alliance with the Saudis, support for the spread of Islamic power within the US and the West, and occasional bombing of Muslims in their homelands (Sudan & Somalia look likely targets).
Our elites: "Let them eat tacos."
ReplyDeleteUs (?): "Off with their heads."
Seriously, how to get their attention? Use underlining in our letters to them, perhaps. But not exclamation points. That's too much. We'll save the exclamation points for when we're really angry.
Well, one possibility is that the Democrats don't get [it]... superstitious ignoramuses... emasculated by political correctness.
ReplyDeleteA more likely possibility is that Democrats are complete frauds, who know the truth about demographics-- they have 200 years of experience with and institutional memory about racial topics, after all-- and simply lie, lie, lie, lie, lie.
Party trumps country. Party trumps faith. Party trumps family. Party trumps prosperity.
And, in Obama's case, party trumps race. Those Senate votes forced him to choose between the South Side and the West Side. Obama chose the latter.