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DEL.ICIO.USAnd pigs are flying right and left: Barr says hardcores are wrong on immigration reform, but Vernon Jones says they’re right
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Former congressman Bob Barr was on WGAU (1340 AM) in Athens this morning, defending the immigration reform deal cut by U.S. Sens. Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson.
Here’s the clip that host Tim Bryant sent us.
Says Barr:
“You have a piece of legislation here that contains pretty much everything Republicans have said over the years that is important in immigration reform.
“And yet they are not only are opposed to it but they treated their own sitting U.S. senators quite shabbily at the convention last week, simply because this legislation also recognizes that it would be a practical impossibility to simply get rid of every illegal alien in this country and ship them back to somewhere else.”
So who’s against immigration reform? Why, Vernon Jones, the CEO of DeKalb County government. A Democrat. Who’s plotting an underfunded campaign against some fellow named Chambliss next year.
Jones says he has issues with three components of the reform package. He says the bill offers “amnesty” for illegal immigrants, that the process for granting citizenship is unworkable, and that the concept of temporary workers “is not realistic.”
“To think that all of the people who are already working in this country will voluntarily go back home, pay a significant fine and jump through all of the bureaucratic hoops required by this legislation is sheer fantasy,” Jones said.
Here’s what Jones says about Chambliss, which should put to rest any rumors that the Republican incumbent is encouraging Jones’ candidacy:
“Even worse, though, is the lack of political courage shown by Senator Chambliss. Although deeply involved in writing the bill, the senator now indicates he could change his mind about voting for it. While I think the bill should be voted down, Senator Chambliss’ waffling does not demonstrate the kind of leadership Georgians deserve.”
Comments
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By Jack P
May 24, 2007 3:27 PM | Link to this
Georgia’s US senators just gave me a good reason to vote for some one else.
By pedro
May 24, 2007 6:07 PM | Link to this
Mr. Barr says - they treated their own Senators shabbily… Well, get used to it, sir. We are SICK AND TIRED of having respresentation that doesn’t REPRESENT. The voters spoke last fall - does it appear anyone got the message?? The constinuency is speaking out now - is ANYONE listening? We don’t like the way things are headed - we don’t want “rubber stamps” of wacked-out, greedy, power-hungry political parties. And something like immigration (which has been broken for 10 years) should not have legislation RUSHED through because the President want it before the Memorial Day break.
By Justin
May 24, 2007 9:38 PM | Link to this
You folks just don’t get it and never will. No point in trying to give you the facts. Deport them all in your small minds, cause that’s the only way it could be done.
By Backfrom Iraq
May 24, 2007 10:02 PM | Link to this
Mega Ditto’s Jack P; Georgia’s senior senator has given me a good reason to vote for some one else and Vernon Jones is a strong supporter of law enforcement.
“we the people” are in charge!
By BackfromIraq - We Need to tal
May 24, 2007 10:30 PM | Link to this
Backfrom Iraq, thanks for serving the country. When it comes to Vernon Jones and law enforcement, he has meddles in law enforcement more so than any other elected county official in the state. He pushed out beloved and homegrown longtime police chief Eddie Moody, then pushed out interim Cheif Nick Marinelli, who was promising to make major changes, and then hired Terrell Bolton, who left his previous job under shady circumstances. DeKalb lost huge numbers of veteran officers and morale is at an all time low.
Don’t be fooled by anything Vernon says or does, especially concerning law enforcement.
By Duke
May 25, 2007 3:33 PM | Link to this
The problem with this legislation (immigration reform) is the main problem with the Bush Administration. The Immigration Bill contains a “sense of Congress” statement that the Security and Prosperity Partnership should be rapidly implemented. The SPP is a controversial operation being implemented at very high levels of the Executive Branches of the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, perhaps as high as the Cabinet level. There is no legislative oversight. The SPP is working for union between the three North American countries. Everyone denies it is happening at all, but here is a statement in a bill recommending its rapid implementation. The implementation is in fact far advanced already, with working groups (whose work is secret) ironing out agreements about bureaucratic regulations. Remember. there is no legislative involvement in this. The dollar will be replaced by a North American currency, called the Amero.
Former Senator Sam Nunn is head of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a powerful think tank which includes people like Henry Kissinger and Richard Armitage. This group will soon present its recommendation to Congress that the three North American countries should be merged into a single entity- political, economic, and security union. Does our former Senator have any concerns about discarding the U.S. Constitution? These young folks under 30 don’t know any better, but Senator Nunn was surely educated about the extraordinary wisdom of our founding fathers.
President Bush is summoning Congressmen to the White House in groups of two or three, without telling them the purpose of the meeting. Then he brings out the heavy hitters to make the case for North American union, the sort of legendary figures that few Congressmen would dare to challenge. Make no mistake: this surrenders U.S. sovereignty. It also surrenders the precious freedoms that our forefathers fought and died for.
CSIS, Senator Nunn’s gang, says this union is necessary so that our region can compete in a global economy.
Our southwestern border is a war zone. There is a strong movement to retake the region for Mexico. Property owners in the region reasonably fear for their lives. President Bush’s prosecutors are imprisoning Border Patrol agents for aggresively doing their jobs. With the BP already shorthanded, the Administration is recruiting BP agents for service in Iraq.
It seems to me that with the aging population of the U.S., we need these young immigrants. If we could win the domestic culture war, we could easily construct an immigration policy which would admit desirable immigrants only. We insist that immigrants learn to be Americans. The problem is that our own children in our public schools are not learning to become Americans.
By Chris
May 25, 2007 3:58 PM | Link to this
Sweet Jesus, it’s the end times, I have just agreed with something Vernon Jones said. Save us all!!!!
By Philly
May 25, 2007 5:10 PM | Link to this
If the GOP wants to keep Georgia’s Senate Seat next year, then they will be well advised to find someone to run against Chambliss. I have talked to m any longtime GOP activists and they will vote Saxby out of office if he votes for this bill. Roy Barnes would give Chambliss a run for his money.
From Dustin Inman: The Senate tonight finished four days of amendments and procedural votes on the S. 1348 Kennedy/Bush Comprehensive Amnesty bill. It won’t resume debate and final votes until after the Memorial Day week recess.
Sen. Vitter (R-La.) — as he did a year ago before the Senate passed the S. 2611 amnesty — offered an amendment today that would have stripped out all provisions to reward nearly all the 12-20 million illegal aliens with permanent legal status.
It lost 29-66.
There actually are some reasons to be encouraged by this vote, which I will explain later.
HERE ARE THE HEROES OF THE DAY WHO VOTED ‘YES’ ON DELETING ANY LANGUAGE THAT WOULD GIVE AMNESTY TO ILLEGAL ALIENS
Alabama: Sessions (R-AL), Yea Shelby (R-AL), Yea Arkansas: Pryor (D-AR), Yea Colorado: Allard (R-CO), Yea
Idaho: Crapo (R-ID), Yea Iowa: Grassley (R-IA), Yea Kansas: Roberts (R-KS), Yea
Kentucky: Bunning (R-KY), Yea McConnell (R-KY), Yea Louisiana: Landrieu (D-LA), Yea Vitter (R-LA), Yea Mississippi: Cochran (R-MS), Yea
Missouri: Bond (R-MO), Yea McCaskill (D-MO), Yea Montana: Baucus (D-MT), Yea Tester (D-MT), Yea Nebraska: Nelson (D-NE), Yea
New Hampshire: Sununu (R-NH), Yea North Carolina: Dole (R-NC), Yea North Dakota: Dorgan (D-ND), Yea
Oklahoma: Coburn (R-OK), Yea Inhofe (R-OK), Yea South Carolina: DeMint (R-SC), Yea South Dakota: Thune (R-SD), Yea
Tennessee: Alexander (R-TN), Yea Corker (R-TN), Yea West Virginia: Byrd (D-WV), Yea Rockefeller (D-WV), Yea Wyoming: Enzi (R-WY), Yea
We will be giving you opportunities to reinforce that behavior and try to ensure that each of these Senators ends up voting against the cloture on the final bill in June.
All of us across America thank those of you who live in the above states and who have provided the kind of contact and pressure on your Senators to get that kind of result.
We especially salute those of you in Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Oklahoma, Tennessee and West Virginia because BOTH your Senators voted to kill the amnesty!
Those of you who don’t have your state listed above may have a lot of excuses for why your Senators are so willing to reward illegal behavior and shut out non-employed vulnerable American workers from those jobs.
But the fact is that this country faces a disaster unless those of you without your state on the above list turn up the pressure and get at least one of your Senators on the anti-amnesty list.
If seven Senators who voted NO had instead voted YES, the amnesty would have been deleted. If we can hold the above Senators on the final bill, we have a chance to kill the whole bill in June if the rest of you do something about your state’s Senators.
It is so very important that we not take these Senators for granted — that you praise them and also let them know how much you are counting on them to vote against cloture on the final bill in June.
The really big Republican surprise was Sen. McConnell (R-Ky.). As the Republican Senate leader, he has primarily carried water for Pres. Bush and has constantly spoken in the media of the need to get a comprehensive bill through. Nearly everything he has done has indicate that he wants an amnesty to pass. So, we are really puzzled by this vote. Maybe you Kentuckians can tell us what you have been doing. Does this mean that he might vote against the overall bill? We have no indication that he will do so.
WE’RE GAINING AMONG DEMOCRATS
Perhaps the most encouraging thing about this vote was the fact that 9 Democrats joined 20 Republicans. THESE SENATORS ARE NOW ON RECORD AS FAVORING AMNESTY AND REWARDS FOR 12-20 MILLION ILLEGAL ALIENS
If your state is on this list, you have your work cut out for you. Please do not let any of the Senators off the hook. They voted NO on the Vitter amendment.
Alaska: Murkowski (R-AK), Nay Stevens (R-AK), Nay Arizona: Kyl (R-AZ), Nay McCain (R-AZ), Nay Arkansas: Lincoln (D-AR), Nay
California: Boxer (D-CA), Nay Feinstein (D-CA), Nay Colorado: Yea Salazar (D-CO), Nay Connecticut: Dodd (D-CT), Nay Lieberman (ID-CT), Nay
Delaware: Biden (D-DE), Nay Carper (D-DE), Nay Florida: Martinez (R-FL), Nay Nelson (D-FL), Nay Georgia: Chambliss (R-GA), Nay Isakson (R-GA), Nay
Hawaii: Akaka (D-HI), Nay Inouye (D-HI), Nay Idaho: Craig (R-ID), Nay Illinois: Durbin (D-IL), Nay Obama (D-IL), Nay
Indiana: Bayh (D-IN), Nay Lugar (R-IN), Nay Iowa: Harkin (D-IA), Nay Maine: Collins (R-ME), Nay Snowe (R-ME), Nay
Maryland: Cardin (D-MD), Nay Mikulski (D-MD), Nay Massachusetts: Kennedy (D-MA), Nay Kerry (D-MA), Nay Michigan: Levin (D-MI), Nay Stabenow (D-MI), Nay
Minnesota: Coleman (R-MN), Nay Klobuchar (D-MN), Nay Mississippi: Lott (R-MS), Nay Nebraska: Hagel (R-NB) Nay
Nevada: Ensign (R-NV), Nay Reid (D-NV), Nay New Hampshire: Gregg (R-NH), Nay New Jersey: Lautenberg (D-NJ), Nay Menendez (D-NJ), Nay
New Mexico: Bingaman (D-NM), Nay Domenici (R-NM), Nay New York: Clinton (D-NY), Nay North Carolina: Burr (R-NC), Nay
North Dakota: Conrad (D-ND), Nay Ohio: Brown (D-OH), Nay Voinovich (R-OH), Nay Oregon: Smith (R-OR), Nay Wyden (D-OR), Nay
Pennsylvania: Casey (D-PA), Nay Specter (R-PA), Nay Rhode Island: Reed (D-RI), Nay Whitehouse (D-RI), Nay South Carolina: Graham (R-SC), Nay
Texas: Cornyn (R-TX), Nay Hutchison (R-TX), Nay Utah: Bennett (R-UT), Nay Vermont: Leahy (D-VT), Nay Sanders (I-VT), Nay
Virginia: Warner (R-VA), Nay Webb (D-VA), Nay Washington: Cantwell (D-WA), Nay Murray (D-WA), Nay