Much will be written in the coming days as to why the amnesty immigration bill failed. In my opinion, there isn’t a single reason why. It isn’t even so much that there were lots of reasons why it failed. The simplest reason for its failure is that there wasn’t a compelling reason to pass it.

Here’s why I’ve reached that conclusion. Most importantly, this bill didn’t secure the Mexican-US border. A majority of Republicans and independents state that that had to be the bill’s first priority, meaning that the bill was pushing uphill into a stiff headwind the entire way. Despite McCain’s and Kennedy’s protestations to the contrary, there simply wasn’t proof that the co-authors were serious about stopping the flow of illegal immigrants.

McCain picked the wrong hill to fight his battle on. When the bill reduced the amount of fence from 854 miles to 370 miles, it’s impossible to convince people that you’re serious about border enforcement.

That fight got even tougher after John Cornyn’s op-ed last Sunday talking about how backlogged USCIS was:

The State and Homeland Security departments had three full years to prepare for an easily foreseeable flood of new passport applications. However, we are seeing the results. Planning and staffing for the new law has been woefully inadequate.

Tens of thousands of U.S. citizens who applied for passports in January and February of this year, anticipating travel this summer, have not yet received their documents. The passport office is in near-chaos. All over the United States, people are turning to congressional offices seeking help.

Some critics are justifiably asking: If the federal government cannot even handle routine passport applications for U.S. citizens, how can it possibly do thorough background checks and issue visas for millions of foreign-born applicants?

That op-ed, which was picked up by newspapers all across the nation, told people that the language in the bill was meaningless because it couldn’t be enforced. It essentially said that visa enforcement wouldn’t happen. The American people simply wouldn’t tolerate that.

What I found hilarious was Ted Kennedy’s prediction earlier tonight:

“It’s touch and go. It’s extremely close,” said Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, (D-MA), as negotiators worked to salvage the measure, a top priority for President Bush that’s under attack from the right and left.

Here’s what the AP reported later:

The bipartisan compromise championed by the president failed a crucial test when it could not attract even a simple majority for an effort to speed its passage.

It’s obvious that Sen. Kennedy was lying through his teeth when he said that it was “extremely close.” It couldn’t even attract a majority of senators on the cloture motion, much less get the sixty votes required to invoke cloture.

I’ll predict that this won’t be the last attempt at immigration reform. Ted Kennedy wants this too badly to let this setback stop him. Kennedy is a big open borders supporter. He also knows that George Soros won’t keep opening his checkbook to support Democrats if they don’t continue pushing for Soros’ pet projects. And there’s no doubt that he wants an open border between Mexico and the United States.

Proponents had argued that the bill, on balance, was worth advancing. “We can all find different aspects of this legislation that we differ with,” said Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, the leading Democratic architect of the bill. He held out hope after the vote that the measure would survive. “Doing nothing is not an alternative,” Kennedy said. “This issue isn’t going away.”

Doing nothing is a viable option if open borders legislation is the other option. On the other hand, Sen. Kennedy is right in saying that this issue isn’t going away. I just wish he’d see that nothing will happen until they get serious about building the fence and enforcing existing laws.

I’m betting that most Republicans are now wary of the ‘comprehensive immigration approach’ because they know that they’ll face primary challenges if they support it. In fact, I’m betting that Lindsey Graham is preparing for a primary fight. I’m predicting that he’ll be out spinning things before this weekend is over.

When you make deals with Ted Kennedy the devil, you’re bound to get singed.

Technorati Tags: Ted Kennedy, George Soros, Lindsey Graham, Harry Reid, Amnesty, Sovereignty, Border Enforcement, Election 2008

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

1. [...] Cross-posted at California Conservative Categories: Homeland Security, National Security, Terrorism, Hispanics, President Bush, Immigration, Kennedy, Democrats, Special Interests, Appeasement, Election 2008, Law Enforcement, RINOs | [...]

   Pingback by Let Freedom Ring » Blog Archive » A Failed Attempt — June 7, 2007 @ 10:08 pm

2. [...] Original post by Gary Gross and software by Elliott Back [...]

   Pingback by A Failed Attempt at Conservative Times--Republican GOP news source. — June 7, 2007 @ 10:12 pm

3. [...] Editor’s note: While it may seem that we, concerned Americans, can breath easy for a brief respite, the battle for real immigration reform must — and will — continue. [...]

   Pingback by Border Security: Accept No Substitutes at Conservative Times--Republican GOP news source. — June 8, 2007 @ 12:29 am

1. It may be “touch and go”, depending upon how much gin, vodka, bourbon, scotch or beer, or any combination thereof, one has had.

   Kinda like the “10″ one takes to bed only to find a “1″ and a hangover in the morning.

   Viper.

   Comment by Carlos — June 7, 2007 @ 10:19 pm