Our broken Congress, peopled with many who can't distinguish between legal and illegal, democracy and anarchy, fair and unfair, staggers forward into the final lame duck session with key outcomes yet decided.
Democratic House and Senate leaders both announced that they intend to force votes on the DREAM Act amnesty. Now Senator Harry Reid has chosen Wednesday, December 8—perpetrating another sneak attack the day after the sneak attack by the Japanese on Pearl Harbor 69 years ago.
This followed a week of uncertainty, as Democratic leaders scheduled and rescheduled votes on the DREAM Act in a frantic, last-ditch effort to pass the amnesty legislation. In the end, they had to postpone debate until this week.
In short, while much of America's business remains undone, zealotry continues to the mode de jour for these power players who seem to find endless reasons to go against the overwhelming wishes of American citizens and serve those here illegally.
If the DREAM Act should pass in this lame duck session, one could reasonably expect it to trigger widespread further disaffection among members of both major parties, and the swing voters who dub themselves Independents Some15 million Americans are out of work. The official unemployment rate nears 10%.
But Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) has vowed, in an interview with The Daily Beast published last week, that, if DREAM fails, he and other Hispanic leaders will stage a full-tilt campaign of "civil disobedience" like the African-American Civil Rights movement of the 1960s.
It would seem to me that his party—my party—has already put President Obama into a place where he is a very poor prospect for reelection in the 2012. Perhaps the over-the-top radicalism of people like Gutierrez will get the attention of American citizens.
Gutierrez said in an interview with Newsweek magazine "I have only one loyalty, and that's to the immigrant community".[ Keeping Obama to His Word, by Arian-Campo-Flores, Newsweek, November 29, 2010.]
Imagine, an elected member of Congress has loyalty, not to American citizens, but to a group of foreigners of whom at least 12 million are here illegally.
Sadly, Gutierrez is far from alone. And you thought Charlie Rangel deserved censure! These people seem to want to give the entire country away.
Those of us who have for so long fought this battle for real immigration reform will keep on keeping on, you may be sure.
The Migration Policy Institute estimates that about 2.1 million aliens would be eligible for this Dream Act giveaway, with 500,000 probably immediately signing up with the rest to enroll as time goes on. Another estimate says that there could be half a million beneficiaries in California alone.
This is the result of an abject failure by our elected leaders—who now are kowtowing to aliens, not the people who elected them.
Go figure! Are you angry yet?
Donald A. Collins [email him], is a freelance writer living in Washington DC and a former long time member of the board of FAIR, the Federation for American Immigration Reform. His views are his own.
