American Republic Online

After another flood of grass roots campaigning (read droves of ticked off voters), the Senate backed away from the Immigration Amnesty bill part deux. In a significant, two day turn-around the 2nd Cloture vote failed 46 to 53. That’s a huge swing from 64-35. Today’s vote had 15 Democrats and 38 Republicans voting with the people.
Today, American’s can celebrate that their politicians still fear losing their jobs enough to produce some results. And barring some unforeseen lunacy, the immigration debacle will be dead for the rest of this year’s session. Perhaps, now the government will focus on building that fence they authorized last fall - seeing as they claimed that immigration problem need to be handled right now.

Speaking of the fence, did you hear that some of the fence that was recently built was constructed one to six feet on the Mexican side of the border. Due to Mexican government demands, it must be torn down and rebuilt on US soil. Not only does the flub create another waste of tax payer dollars, it doesn’t really inspire confidence in our border related abilities.

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The “second” immigration bill is up for it’s second cloture vote today to cut off debate and move towards voting for it.  This cloture vote is coming quickly because of an agreed upon limit of 30 hours of debate.  Here’s a link to the amendment package in HTML or PDF format.

• Immigration Amendment Package

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This probably won’t shock you, but people aren’t so happy with the government. But just in case you thought you were alone - don’t.

Here is the breakdown for the annual approval ratings compared to last years:

• Congress 14% (down from 19%) *worst ever recorded since the poll started in 1973
• President 25% (down from 33%)
• Supreme Court 34% (down from 40%)

The so-called forth branch of government and/or the self appointed government watchdogs: the media hasn’t faired any better.

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Kerry on the so-called Fairness Doctrine: “conservatives got rid of the equal time requirements…and have been able to squeeze out opposing views.”  He wants to bring it back.  (Just a refresher: the Supreme Court ruled that the Doctrine “inescapably dampens the vigor and limits the variety of public debate.”)
Again, why is it a good idea for the government to decide what we listen to on the radio?  The question is, where will it end?  Should we make sure there is equal time for communist and anarchy programing?  We want to make sure that all viewpoints are considered.  At what point does the government stop and say it’s up to the listeners to decide?  If we stop and consider that the radio stations are in it for the money, then they will program what people listen to.  Has no one else in this country ever turned to a station and say “I thought this was a country/rock/etc station?”  The format had been changed, because the station managers thought the new format would attract more listeners.  Not because all they really wanted was an all-Latin-all-the-time station.  Is it any wonder why the only stations that can get away with playing classical music are the local public broadcasting?  Most people have no desire to listen to it.  This would inevitably be the case if liberal talk radio programs are forced upon us: they will have to be subsidized.  More tax dollars spent on what the government thinks is best for us.  Not convinced?  Remember Air America?  They had to pay stations to broadcast their shows.  (Limbaugh and his like take a few commercials from the local stations.)  How about this: let us keep our money, so we can spend it on new HD radios so we can hear Limbaugh puff on his cigars.

(For those interested: evil, “conservative” judges Bork and Scalia (not yet on SCOTUS) upheld the FD in 1986.  It was then abolished by the FCC in 1987.  The 100th Congress (a Dem Congress) tried to bring it back, but Reagan vetoed it.  Not exactly a group of back-room conservatives plotting to overthrow the media…)

The Zogby Interactive poll of 8,300 adults nationwide finds just 3% of Americans viewing Congress’s handling of the immigration issue in favorable terms, while 9% say the same of the President-even as respondents in the survey rated it the second most important issue facing the country, after the war in Iraq.

• UPI/Zogby Poll: Government Mishandling Immigration

UPATE (by Jeff): I recently contacted Senator Corker regarding the new immigration bill.  Here’s a part of his response.  Although a form letter, I think he (his staff writers?) nailed it pretty well:

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Paul Jacob has a great piece at the TownHall.com. Here are a few snippets:

There is the America of ever-increasing wealth, innovation, creativity, of a dynamic economy, new jobs, new products and services. Choices galore. Information overload. The abundant work product of freedom.

And there is the politician’s America: The regulated America, the subsidized America, the earmarked America. The failing America.

In one America it is what you produce that gets you ahead. In the other it’s who you know.

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The ratings for NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams have gone down more than Katie Couric’s.  CBS blamed sexism.  Williams take a higher view and said “tough competition keeps everyone sharp and benefits the viewers.”

I doubt it.  It’s sexism: people hate men.  It couldn’t be anything else.

(Although ARO has some ideas about how they might improve their ratings.)

Today by a 64-35 margin, the Senate voted for cloture to bring S. 1639 (the “re-numbered so you think we worked on it” Amnesty bill formerly known as S. 1348) to the floor for debate. There are rumors flying about back room deals trading amendments for cloture votes - which explains the shift from the previous vote a few weeks ago.

The cloture votes are the people’s best chance to stop this bill as it only takes 41 “no” votes instead of 51. There will be another cloture vote to end the debate which will be the last good shot at killing this bill in the Senate again.

All told there were 9 Democratic Senators that voted with the people along with 26 Republicans. Also Sen. Johnson, Dem from SD is still recovering from Brain Surgery. (His “not voting” counts as another “no”) All three Presidential hopefuls - Clinton, Obama & McKain - voted to move Amnesty forward.

• S. 1639 Cloture Vote

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Here’s a contrast for you: Edwards feeling quite pretty, and loving the hairspray.  (I like how he flicks his head back as he’s flicks his hair.  Very presidential.)

Hat tip to Chris