GOP Amnesty
Michelle Malkin has a reference to the Amnesty 8 from NRO today. This has been one busy day and I did not have time to look into everything. However, bear with me, possible errors and all, to see if there is some sense to be made here.
I am making the assumption that the Amnesty 8 is the latest _ _ _ _ list of the Senate members favoring amnesty. So why did they bother placing Democrats on it? How many Dems could possibly be against amnesty? It should be a conservative principle to be against amnesty for millions of law breakers. There are plenty of other conservative principles at play here but certainly opposing amnesty is central. The only hit list should be on GOP candidates that favor amnesty. And the following is the way I see it.
Obviously the Dems have a slim majority and want amnesty to pass. The GOP should be against amnesty. And being in the minority they need more than one Dem to vote with them. There is a great risk in bringing a bad bill to a vote on passage. Therefore you should want to kill it before then. If a cloture vote is only for limiting or ending debate and moving to consider the bill for passage through a vote, then the GOP should want to defeat a cloture and continue debate and let the bill die without going to a vote on passage. That is what happened with S.1348. And that is why Senator Harry Reid had S.1639 introduced. So losing the cloture vote on S.1639 was a bad thing.
What I find interesting is if what I just described is accurate, the list of GOP Senate members favoring amnesty should be 24. On both cloture votes, for S.1348 and S.1639, seven Republican Senators voted for cloture. Here they are:
Graham (R-SC)
Hagel (R-NE)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McCain (R-AZ)
Specter (R-PA)
Voinovich (R-OH)
That was survivable based on the outcome that the cloture vote for S.1348 failed. On the cloture vote for S.1639 the previous list of GOP members also voted for cloture. In addition to those Senators the following GOP members also voted for cloture this time:
Bennett (R-UT)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Burr (R-NC)
Coleman (R-MN)
Collins (R-ME)
Craig (R-ID)
Domenici (R-NM)
Ensign (R-NV)
Gregg (R-NH)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Lott (R-MS)
McConnell (R-KY)
Murkowski (R-AK)
Snowe (R-ME)
Stevens (R-AK)
Warner (R-VA)
Both pieces of legislation would be a mistake to pass and should be killed. So what happened? I’ll tell you what happened. Two of the additions to the list on the 2nd cloture vote are Mitch McConnell and Trent Lott, the two Senate majority leaders. And don’t forget that President Bush is for amnesty. Are you beginning to understand the Republican problem? Not only did they get their butts kicked in the last election for being stupid but they have not yet learned their lesson. And the sad fact is they did not even need all 24 to vote no to defeat the last cloture vote. Ok, there are two sad facts. The second one is both bills are bad. So why kill one only to allow the next to survive?
Tell me if this makes sense to you or not. I do not pretend to be an expert on these matters. This post is my read on how things are in the Senate on amnesty. I’ll have more incentive to use this as ammunition on Senators in the next calls and emails.
Stanford Matthews
MoreWhat.com
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June 27th, 2007 at 11:14 pm
My thoughts are that Lott and McConnell wanted it to pass along…cheap labor and possibly votes now, and future votes. By adding the $4.4 m “surged” immediately, they believe they can make a case that security is handled and so…they can vote for “comprehensive” change. They want to vote for it.
Inhofe and Sessions are heros.
They think aliens and big labor will make a difference for the Republican Party. I sure they are right about that…enough of a difference that other conservatives will stand for election against them.
Maggie
Maggie’s Notebook
June 27th, 2007 at 11:22 pm
This is all so pathetic, and scary: Liberals, who have no idea what is good and proper for this country and its citizens, have a stranglehold on the GOP (for whom I have no sympathy), because they allow themselves to be bullied.
June 27th, 2007 at 11:55 pm
Don’t despair y’all. There is some ass-kickin’ comin’. When is the last time you witnessed this many people po’d? It’s not over by a long shot. This is only the beginning. We may be witnessing a tsunami in politics but the tide has not withdrawn yet. One might even day dream about a viable, third, indepedent party with far reaching appeal before this is all over.
June 28th, 2007 at 2:45 am
I have long recommended a name change for the two parties.
The Dems should be the Perfidious Party.
And the Republican Party should be called -
The Pusillanimous Party
June 28th, 2007 at 3:05 am
Is there a what’s worse between a traitor or a sissy? Google saved me a walk to the library. Ya, I had to look it up.