Here are Senator McCain’s famous comments about the just-passed Senate bill on “comprehensive” immigration reform:

We can and must complete this legislation sooner rather than later. We all know that this issue can be caught up in extracurricular politics unless we move forward as quickly as possible. This is a product of a long hard trail of negotiation, and I am sure that there are certain provisions that each of us would not agree with, but this is what the legislative process is all about, this is what bipartisanship is all about when there is a requirement for this nation and its security that transcends party lines.

We’ll leave it to others to rail against the allegedly nefarious sentiments underlying McCain’s “extracurricular” comment. Our focus is this whopper: that the bill answers “a requirement for this nation and its security that transcends party lines.” Here are some of the key “security” elements as reported in the Washington Post:

The first would make illegal immigrants’ access to long-term visas and the new guest-worker program contingent upon the implementation of the border crackdown. Before those immigrant-rights measures could go into effect, the government must deploy 18,000 new Border Patrol agents and four unmanned aerial vehicles; build 200 miles of vehicle barriers, 370 miles of fencing, and 70 ground-based radar and camera towers; provide funds for the detention of 27,500 illegal immigrants a day; and complete new identification tools to help employers screen out illegal job applicants. Skeptics say those would take years, but Chertoff stressed yesterday that they could be done in 18 months.

“Done in 18 months.” Ha! Why don’t we all check back in in 18 months and see what has been done. The results could range from (a) all of the above; to (b) virtually nothing at all, except whining from the professional grievance class who say that all such security prerequisites are insensitive, unfair and disciminatory. Which do you think it will be?

By the way, we pause to note that this recent bill follows a tradition of 35 years of laissez faire practice on immigration coupled with occasional blather about toughness and reform.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 18th, 2007 at 7:39 am and is filed under General, Law, Republicans. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.