The power of the internet: Talk radio knows the bill better than the Senators do, says Jeff Sessions.

I’d think that bloggers know it better as well. For one thing, I suspect that if the Senators have copies of it, they have paper copies, printed out at Federal expense. We have the annotated web version, and 300 pages of amendments.

Also, the internet has a way of linking activists that wasn’t possible before it existed. See, for example, this email from Roy Beck, asking everyone on his mailing list who might know a Senator personally to contact them:

AN APPEAL TO THOSE OF YOU WITH SPECIAL TIES TO A SENATOR

1. Are you part of the elites or establishment in your community?

2. Have you given any donations to either of your Senators’ campaigns in the past?

3. Do you have any kind of relationship with the Senators, members of theirstaff, local leaders of his/her political party, or somebody who does?

Although most of us are part of the broad public (that tends to be overlooked by Senators), I know that out of 437,000 activist NumbersUSA members, some of you in every state have some special connections.

For those of you who do, I appeal with greatest urgency for you to use every means at your disposal to call your Senator or staff person or political party leader — this afternoon, tonight, tomorrow morning.

We are already hearing from a number of you with these kinds of connections who are making contact. And the effect is powerful.

You cannot overestimate the power of your calling and saying, “I’ve been a friend for years …. ” or “I’m a financial supporter” or something of that kind and then talk about your great concern for the political future of this Senator, as well as for your state, if S. 1639 goes through.

The late Robert A. Heinlein talked about the importance of that kind of contact in his non-fiction book Take Back Your Government , written in 1947, but he was talking about 3 by 5 index cards, 2 cent postcards, and 5 cent telephone calls.

William Gheen of ALIPAC has a different plan:

Please make arrangements to be at the closest “Main State Office” of each Senator that voted YES on CLOTURE.

Tell the office staff “I am a taxpayer and a constituent. I am opposed to this Amnesty bill and want Senator _____ to VOTE NO ON CLOTURE today! I am here to await the results of his/her vote and get that information when it comes in.”

Do not take signs, stickers, or any items. You are merely a voter and a taxpayer, in a taxpayer supported office, seeking information about the Cloture vote. You can continue your calls to DC on your cell phone. Call all local media if you can, tell them who you are, where you are and what you are doing.

OUR GOAL: Word must reach the Senator’s ear, before they vote on Cloture, that there is a group of anti-amnesty concerned constituents talking to press and awaiting their vote on cloture at their main state offices.

Again, that’s the kind of thing that couldn’t be organized on a national basis in the 1940’s, when Heinlein was writing. It’s another example of what can be done by ordinary citizens, with ordinary computers, and one ordinary vote each.

Last night Jay Leno said:

Another scorcher here, today in Los Angeles. I tell you, it was so hot illegal immigrants were going through us just to get to Alaska.

Believe it or not, there are Mexican immigrants in Alaska, mostly legal as far as I know. You have to cross the Canadian border twice to get to Alaska from the US, and it’s too far to walk. But why would Mexicans go there? To get away from the other Mexicans, of course!

There are high wage jobs available in Alaska, and that’s because there are fewer other Mexicans there to bid the price down.

Since even the most lunatic legislators aren’t declaring that “There Shall Be Open Borders,”(you would need to be really crazy to do that) the threatened amnesty is only for illegals who are in the US now, it doesn’t cover any future invaders. Of course, all they would need was a piece of paper to say that they’d been in the US before the qualifying date, and illegals have lots of pieces of paper. This Washington Times story is only the tip of that particular iceberg, but it demonstrates what we’ve been saying about the possibilities of fraud implicit in Amnesty.

Amnesty’ fake papers pledged in wiretap

By Stephen Dinan and Jerry Seper
June 27, 2007

ONLINE EXCLUSIVE:
The head of a Mexican forgery ring was convinced he could make phony documents that illegal aliens could use to indicate fraudulently that they were eligible for a new amnesty, says a government affidavit recounting wiretapped phone calls the man made.

Julio Leija-Sanchez, who ran a $3 million-a-year forgery operation before he was arrested in April, was expecting Congress to pass a legalization program, which he called “amnesty,” and said he could forge documents to fool the U.S. government into believing illegal aliens were in the country in time to qualify for amnesty, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent said in the affidavit.

In recounting a wiretapped telephone conversation, ICE agent Jason E. Medica said he heard Mr. Leija-Sanchez tell an associate the forgery ring could “fix his papers” to meet the requirements of a legalization program such as the bill the Senate is debating today.

HotAir.com has a suggestion that anyone who might have contributed to the Republican Party, in the belief that there was “dime’s worth of difference” between the two parties on immigration, should call up and demand their money back. Here’s the video:

And here’s what it says

They just don’t listen.

You’ve called, you’ve faxed, you’ve e-mailed your objection to the Illegal Alien Amnesty Bill. But they didn’t listen.

Instead, they did the bidding of Big Business. Big Business lobbyists pour cash into politics and fund grand advertising campaigns. Most Americans are limited to small donations and have no voice in the media.

But if you’re a conservative fed up with Republican scheming on this bill, you can do something about it. If you gave to the party in the past year, you can demand your money back. Call the Republican National Committee today and demand a full refund.

If you gave to any senator or congressman in the past year, call their office and demand a full refund.

Money seems to be the one thing our politicians understand.

Maybe they’ll listen if we speak their language.

This was the cloture vote to consider the Kennedy-Bush-McCain amnesty bill without holding public hearings like a normal piece of legislation would have. Back on May 21, this same cloture vote passed 69-23. Then, the second cloture vote (to limit debate–i.e., prevent a filibuster) failed 45-60.

So, it’s not over yet. But, don’t be optimistic. The powers-that-be have all sorts of carrots and sticks to whip Senators in line. The White House and the Senate can hand out or withhold an enormous amount of pork. The press won’t tell us about the backroom deals because corruption in the the higher cause of immigration has always been okay with them (as the remarkable lack of publicity about the corruption that undermined the employer sanctions in the “Grand Bargain” of 1986 shows).

So, the crucial second cloture vote, which will come up very shortly while the public’s attention has drifted toward getting ready for the Fourth of July weekend, is going to be close and decisive.

Trapper John writes at the DailyKos about the recent Senate immigration legislation:

But the fact that Tancredo and the Minutemen oppose this bill doesn’t make it something worth supporting. It’s not. And when you look at it closely, it’s a bill that progressives ought to vigorously oppose.

In fact, this immigration bill is an historically bad bill, one that will undermine wage markets and which will permanently cripple skills training in vital sectors of the economy. And — contrary to Lou Dobbs and the nativists — the critical problem with the bill has nothing to do with the path to citizenship provided therein. Hell, everyone this side of the Minutemen agrees that there needs to be a humane path to citizenship for those undocumented workers who are living, working, and contributing in the United States. The fact that this bill provides a version of that path is about the only positive aspect of the legislation. No, the fatal flaw in this bill isn’t “amnesty” — it’s the euphemistically termed “temporary worker program.”

I’m glad to see a progressive discussing the problems with the proposed guest worker legislations.

Trapper John is making some major errors that have been promoted in the Corporate Media.

First off, grants of citizenship don’t come for free–particularly when extended to populations less skilled and less productive than existing American populations. The Americans that will bear the cost of those citizenship grants most heavily are those Americans that are younger, less skilled and more likely to compete directly with recent immigrants. I’ve seen other progressives claim that the problems with H-1b expansion wouldn’t have existed if those foreign workers had been granted green cards instead of temporary worker visas. That is a highly questionable claim without universal support from the economics profession.

Secondly, there are polls that claim that Americans prefer a “path to citizenship” to a rapid deportation. That is far from the only potential option-and those other options aren’t discussed in those polls. Steve Sailor and I have both discussed the possibility of buyouts for recent immigrants. Given that we have at least $250 Billion in uncollected immigration violation fines, there is a substantial pot of money to work with here.

Thirdly, it should be mentioned that the legislation is a huge amnesty for employers of illegal immigrant labor.

It is sad so many progressives are unwilling to go after illegal employers. More attention needs to be given to progressive writers like Thom Hartman and myself who have written extensively on the topic of immigration.

Both of Tennessee’s Senators voted against cloture on the bill, and they’ve made a point of announcing it.

6/26/2007 - Corker, Alexander Vote Against Cloture On Immigration Bill - Breaking News - Chattanoogan.com

Corker, Alexander Vote Against Cloture On Immigration Bill
posted June 26, 2007

Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) on Tuesday voted against cloture on S.1639, the immigration reform bill. The cloture motion passed by a vote of 64 to 35, but Corker has stated that he will vote against the bill in its final form as well.

The 64 votes were four above the minimum needed to revive the controversial bill.

Sen. Corker said, “I voted against cloture on the immigration bill, as I have already done twice during this debate, and I plan to vote against the bill in its final form.

“I believe a better approach would be a more modest bill that focuses on border security, employer identification, and putting systems in place that will put us in a position to actually enforce a new immigration policy.

“We have lost credibility in Washington on this issue, and before the American people will be willing to get behind an immigration policy, we need to demonstrate to them that the federal government is going to do what it says it will do, especially when it comes to securing our border.”[MORE]

Most people don’t know or care who voted on what, in the Senate or the House. Most of the time, it’s only policy wonks, or people with an individual stake in a bill who have any idea what’s going on here. This is big. Kay Bailey Hutchison made a similar announcement in Texas.

It looks like the people who didn’t support this thing are looking ahead to what the voters will do to the Senators who did.

Joe Guzzardi will be a guest on the George Putnam Show today, Wednesday, at 1:06 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time. Listen live here

That’s the headline on the Los Angeles Times story posted early this morning:

WASHINGTON — Even as the Senate voted Tuesday to restart the stalled debate on immigration legislation, Democratic support for the bill appeared to be slipping, and could jeopardize it as much as fierce Republican opposition does.

A handful of Democrats who could be crucial to the bill’s fate, including California’s Barbara Boxer, remains undecided. And Tuesday, five Democrats who welcomed debate on the issue a month ago switched position and voted to oppose further discussion of the bill.

The 64-35 procedural vote to move to a debate — four more votes than the required 60 — resuscitated the controversial bill, which collapsed earlier this month in a partisan dispute. But the vote also exposed hardened opposition among Republicans and increased skepticism among Democrats.

Immigration bill’s support slipping: The Senate votes to resume debate on the border measure, but with the backing of fewer Democrats, By Nicole Gaouette and Noam N. Levey, June 27 2007.

Of course, the Senate did not actually vote to resume debate: it voted to curtail debate– cloture–which everyone sees as the only way to get the thing through, in itself evidence of its weakness. I’ve written before that immigration enthusiasts in D.C. can never be written off and the whole struggle may be about to move to another and even more unpleasant plane. But a quick check of the embattled group of immigration reform patriots in the imperial capital finds them also surprisingly optimistic–assuming America’s backlash continues.