Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Amnesty, a Shamnesty, a Scamnesty


This evening I caught part of the Sean Hannity Radio show. Sean interviewed Ohio Senator George V. Voinovich regarding the so-called Comprehensive Immigration Reform Bill (S.1639), Amnesty for short, that is currently being debated in the Senate. Senator Voinovich admitted to Sean that he had not read the bill, only some summaries of the bill. Senator Voinovich also admitted that he had not read Robert Rector’s Heritage Foundation report on the cost of the “reform” bill and could not answer Hannity’s questions on the cost impact of the Amnesty bill. The Senator seemed quite irritated in being confronted when Sean pointed out that the bill was being rushed through without proper deliberation or adequate cost analysis. The Senator seemed to be squirming and his responses where not as sharp and thoughtful as you would expect for such a supposedly "critcal" and costly law.

In response to the loud outcry of the people on the Amnesty bill, Senator Voinovich responded that he received a lot of threatening emails and phone calls. To that he said that he had been in politics for 40 years and that no one was going to intimidate George Voinovich into voting one way or another. He implied that he would vote for what he and he alone, felt best for the country.

Senator Voinovich also implied that the Amnesty bill would not hurt Medicare or Social Security because probably 1/3 of the 12 million immigrants would go back home voluntarily. Sean asked the Senator what he based this figure on and the Senator did not answer. Hannity said that he thought that the Senator pulled that figure out of the air and had not on which to base it.

Senator Voinovich was noncommittal on how he would vote on cloture tomorrow morning. He seemed to imply that he was still listening to both sides of the debate and that he would look at all sides of the issue.

The Senators are moving along with the flow allowing this important piece of legislation to float down the river without regard for the damage that it would do when it arrived at its destination. It seems that the Senators are not deliberating sufficiently on this bill. The President in cahoots with the Democratic Senate leadership has drawn in the GOP leadership and too many GOP Senators into agreeing to advancing an unfinished, unnecessary, untimely and unwieldy budget-busting bill.

Please urge Senators Voinovich and Sherrod Brown to vote against cloture tomorrow and against this bill if it ever comes up for a vote.

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