[From Radio Derb] The draft proposals on legislation to amnesty illegal aliens, drawn up by the House Republican leadership and reported on Radio Derb last week, have not gone over well. They have in fact gone over like the proverbial lead balloon with Republicans of all estates: Republican voters, Republican commentators, and even Republican congressweasels. Nobody likes them.

The commentators were particularly scathing. It wasn't just us foam-flecked ranters at TakiMag and VDARE, nor even the fringe-respectable Right like Pat Buchanan and Ann Coulter (though Ann wrote a brilliant column on the event). This time Rush Limbaugh, Thomas Sowell, Phyllis Schlafly, and David Frum all had pieces against the House leaders' proposals. National Review and the Weekly Standard piled on. When even the neocons are picking up pitchforks and flaming brands, the lords of the GOP manor know they're in trouble.

The House Republican leadership who cooked up this dreck and assumed their members would dutifully get in line to vote for it are now, on this issue, leaders without followers. The image of Nicolae Ceau?escu on that balcony comes to mind. John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Paul Ryan, and Kevin McCarthy find themselves trapped in a very nasty example of what Marxists call a "contradiction," with their corporate paymasters strongly supporting amnesty and their voters strongly opposing it.

For an old immigration restrictionist it's all very delicious to watch. The satisfaction is purely internal, of course. A prophet is without honor in his own country, and the fact that the Weekly Standard is now at last saying things that I said fourteen years ago won't do me any good. Like the "premature anti-fascists" of the 1940s—leftists who grumbled that they had hated Hitler before hating Hitler was cool—we premature immigration-restrictionists will find no reward for our foresight on this side of the grave. Still, it's satisfying.

As Radio Derb goes to tape it looks as though amnesty is dead in the water for this congressional session. The Boehner cyborg has, according to the Washington Times, quote: "ruled out any action until President Obama proves to Republicans' satisfaction that he is serious about enforcing the laws," end quote.

There's wiggle room for Boehner in there, and the House leader may be plotting some new act of treason. He's not as stupid as he looks— couldn't be!—and eternal vigilance is the watchword. As the saying goes: They only have to win once, we have to win every fight.

Still, this was a good week for immigration patriots, and I think that, as Winston Churchill said on a different occasion , quote: "We may permit ourselves a brief period of jubilation."