Kathryn Jean Lopez at National Review Online finds a good quote from Reagan’s Attorney General Ed Meese, comparing the 1986 amnesty to the McCain-Kennedy amnesty bill from last year:

In the mid-80′s, many members of Congress – pushed by the Democratic majority in the House and the Select Commission on Immigration and Refugee Policy – advocated amnesty for long-settled illegal immigrants.

….

…most illegal immigrants who could establish that they had resided in America continuously for five years would be granted temporary resident status, which could be upgraded to permanent residency after 18 months and, after another five years, to citizenship.

So the current proposal isn’t like the ’86 amnesty, it’s worse on two counts: it includes many millions more people, and it drops the requirement that the illegal alien be “long-settled” – instead of needing to have been living here for five years, now it’s only five months, since January of this year. What possible rationale is there to grant legal status to people who just snuck across the border a few short months ago, and have no roots in this country? Ridiculous.

But the real root of the problem with the current proposed bill is that there’s no confidence the enforcement provisions will be carried out any more effectively than they were after 1986. So it matters little what the specifics of those provisions are. That’s why “enforcement first” is the only thing that makes sense at this point – the federal government needs to demonstrate that they can control the border. The promises just don’t have any credibility at this point.

One of the problems with being elected to high office is that is seems to strip away any self-awareness or sense of irony. It has a tendency to turn people who appear to be otherwise decent, normal Americans into arrogant, out-of-touch gasbags. Illustrating the point, Republican Senator Lindsay Graham, speaking in March to the liberal racial-activist group the “National Council of La Raza” (while promising to push for a “comprehensive immigration reform”, i.e. amnesty, bill), said:

…we’re not going run people down, we’re not going to scapegoat people, we’re going to tell the bigots to shut up…

Can you spot the contradiction? If so, that probably means you aren’t an elitist senator or a member of some left-wing activist group. We just hope the disease hasn’t progressed too far, and perhaps Mr. Graham will find the decency to apologize and retract these foolish and offensive comments.

File this in the giant file cabinet full of evidence his election loss in 2000 drove Al Gore crazy. He may in fact be the very first BDS* sufferer. There’s no other explanation for how the man that tried to cherry-pick votes in Democratic-leaning precincts to steal the election, who claims a small increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide will cause sea levels to rise 20 feet (far from the scientific consensus), who maniacally bellowed red-faced that the president “betrayed this country”, could write a supposedly serious book about the decline of political discourse in America called “The Assault on Reason”.

According to ABC News, Gore claims in the book –

…that if “Bush and Cheney actually believed in the linkage (between Iraq and al Qaeda) that they asserted — in spite of all the evidence to the contrary presented to them contemporaneously — that would by itself in light of the available evidence, make them genuinely unfit to lead our nation. On the other hand, if they knew the truth and lied, massively and repeatedly, isn’t that worse? Are they too gullible or too dishonest?”

But as we’ve noted repeatedly, the consensus view before the invasion of Iraq, the view presented to the Bush administration and to the Clinton administration (perhaps Gore isn’t lying, perhaps he was asleep at all the meetings) by the CIA, was that Iraq was a state sponsor of terrorism, was a threat to the United States and the region, and had weapons of mass destruction. The Clinton administration considered Iraq a threat and President Clinton signed the Iraq Liberation Act in 1998. Did Al Gore forget all that, or is he being disingenuous?

Perhaps Gore hasn’t completely lost his mind, despite all the evidence to the contrary. Maybe he doesn’t really believe all the hysteria and bile he’s been spewing the last few years. That would by itself in light of the available evidence, make him genuinely unfit to lead our nation (or to lecture anyone else about “reason”). On the other hand, if he knows the truth and lied, massively and repeatedly, isn’t that worse?

UPDATE: Fox News did a good debunking of some of the bunk in Gore’s book on Tuesday, transcript here.

Jeff Jacoby nails an important distinction in his column today in the Boston Globe:

[Ron] Paul helps illustrate what may be the most significant difference between the two major parties today: Republicans who don’t take the threat of radical Islam seriously are marginalized. Democrats who don’t do so constitute their party’s mainstream.

If the BDS-sufferers, the “netroots”, etc. were a marginalized fringe in the Democratic Party, that would be one thing, but when they cavort with Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy, Howard Dean, John Edwards, and the other top-tier presidential candidates, there is a very serious problem in the party, with serious negative implications for the country. If they force a retreat in Iraq, it will not just hurt President Bush, or Republicans, it will hurt all Americans. When evaluating candidates, Americans need to consider the company those candidates choose to keep. No candidate can possibly pick and choose every supporter, but they do decide who they choose to associate themselves with.

Opponents of enforcing U.S. immigration laws have lately been using the canard that deporting illegal aliens caught in workplace raids is inhumane because it separates families. This is obvious nonsense on its face, since no one suggests those deported should be forced to leave their families in the United States. If a citizen of Mexico, or France, Britain, wherever, is sent back to his own country, he is free to take his wife and kids with him. If he decides it’s best to leave them here, that is his choice, not a penalty imposed by the government. Although it’s true many of the children of illegals are citizens and have every right to live in the U.S., they also have every right to go live in the home country of their parents.

But it turns out that, according to an AP story about illegal aliens’ reactions to the proposed Senate amnesty bill, it may be just as likely that a deportation will reunite a family as separate one. Via Yahoo News:

David Guerra wants to be legal, but he says the path to citizenship offered by the Senate on Thursday would be too risky and too expensive, and could end up driving him deeper into the shadows.

Guerra’s wife and children in El Salvador depend on the $300 he sends home each month from his job as a day laborer. Key provisions of the legislation would require him to return home to apply for residency, pay a $5,000 fine and spend thousands more in application fees.

….

Amy Ndour, a 23-year-old illegal immigrant from Senegal who lives in New York, said she would be willing to pay the $5,000 fine, but not return home because her family there depends on what she earns as a hair braider.

….

Many illegal immigrants said they had little incentive to apply for residency because the process was long and did not offer much hope of bringing their families.

“If I’ll never be able to bring my family, why should I apply?” said Jose Monson, a 33-year-old illegal immigrant from Guatemala who has lived in Los Angeles for four years. “I prefer to just stay here illegally.”

….

In Houston, Marco Antonio Rodiguez, said he would be happy with a permit that would allow him to work legally and return to Mexico twice a year to see his wife and three children.

We’d be happy to see Mr. Rodiguez live in Mexico with his wife and three kids full time, so he can see them every day. After all, family values don’t stop at the Rio Grande. So we should all support strong border enforcement – for the rule of law, for national security, and most of all, for the children.

A lot of attention has been paid to Rudy Giuliani’s position on abortion, and to his muddled answer to the abortion question at the first Republican presidential primary debate May 3rd. But not much focus has been put on what may be the most problematic part of his answer. As quoted by Charles Krauthammer in his latest column:

On repealing Roe v. Wade:

Giuliani: It would be okay to repeal. It would be also [okay] if a strict constructionist judge viewed it as precedent, and I think a judge has to make that decision.

Moderator: Would it be okay if they didn’t repeal it?

Giuliani: I think the court has to make that decision, and then the country can deal with it. . . . States can make their own decisions.

It’s fine to have disagreement about what the role of government should be in regulating abortion, but that last part of Giuliani’s answer was just factually wrong and contradictory. It bears repeating that if Roe is overturned, it won’t make abortion illegal in the United States, it will merely return the issue to the democratic process – i.e. it will allow states to decide.

But if Roe is not overturned, then states can’t make their own decisions. It’s an either/or proposition – either you’re for judges deciding or you’re for the states deciding. Mr. Giuliani can’t have it both ways on that question, pro-choice or not. Perhaps he simply misspoke as he was being cut off in the overly rushed format of the debate. As he seeks to clarify his position on abortion, he needs to clarify what he was trying to say in that instance as well. He needs to demonstrate that he understands all of the issues involved – the larger questions about the constitution and the proper role of judges as well as the abortion issue. Ones position on Roe and on abortion are two separate issues.

This morning on Fox News Sunday, Giuliani basically repeated his answer from the debate, unfortunately including the “let states decide” part:

GIULIANI: What I meant to convey [during the May 3rd debate] – if I didn’t convey it correctly, I’ll convey it again. The country could handle it. I mean, the country – we’ve got a federal system. What would happen is states would make decisions.

Chris Wallace did a good job in pressing him on his abortion views, and Mr. Giuliani’s position about not having a litmus test for judicial nominations was reasonable (overall, Giuliani handled himself quite well throughout the interview), but Wallace should have pressed for an answer to the question of whether Giuliani himself thinks Roe was decided wrongly. We at least would still like to hear a clear answer to that question.

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Pro-Choice, Anti-Roe
“Schumer Is Right”

What is it with Barack Obama and these off-the-wall analogies? Last time, it was a ludicrous comparison of the Virginia Tech shooter and Don Imus. Now it’s fascism, communism, and putting gasoline in your car.

“At the dawn of the twenty-first century, the country that faced down the tyranny of fascism and communism is now called to challenge the tyranny of oil.”

“The tyranny of oil”? And no, he isn’t referring to the fact the Islamo-fascists gain some benefit from the sale of Middle Eastern oil, which is a legitimate concern, as is the need to diversify our energy sources.

We don’t believe Mr. Obama really misunderstands real evil to the extent his words suggest. He just seems to care more about having good speech lines than about making thoughtful arguments.

Can a decent, honest person, an American who loves his country and cares about the country’s welfare, continue to say that “Bush lied us into war”? A corollary question is, can a person who makes that statement simultaneously complain that “America’s reputation in the world” has been diminished? The answer to both of these questions is no. In light of current evidence, anyone who continues to repeat the “Bush lied” mantra is simply not being honest. Of course there are honest arguments about the war, but that is not one of them.

One reason, perhaps the major reason, for George Tenet’s new book, “At the Center of the Storm”, is to try to salvage his reputation in the wake of the intelligence failures of 9/11 and the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. How much blame Tenet should get for those failures is an argument for another day. One can argue that he’s spinning some of the stories, but it would be ridiculous to assume that in any case he would spin an incident to make himself look worse. In other words, any spin is going to be in the direction of benefiting George Tenet, he’s not going to be spouting the White House line.

So Mr. Tenet could have attempted to make the case that he tried to tell the Bush administration that there was real doubt Iraq had WMD, but they invaded anyway. He also could have minimized or ignored the evidence of links between Iraq and al Qaeda. He could have done what many have been doing since the failure to find WMD stockpiles in Iraq – he could have gone back into old reports and cherry-picked out the footnotes and caveats to try to make the case there was a lot of doubt before the war that the president simply ignored. But in his book he did not. Sunday morning on Meet the Press, he did not. He confirmed the consensus view before the invasion – that Iraq was a state sponsor of terrorism, possessed chemical and biological weapons, and continued it’s pursuit of nuclear capability. It was that consensus, and not some dark neo-con fantasy cooked up in Dick Cheney’s office, that led the president to act.

He said there was no evidence showing complicity, or command and control, of any terrorist operation against the United States. He did not say there wasn’t any connection between Iraq and al Qaeda. He did not say Iraq wasn’t a state sponsor of terrorism. He did say there were various contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda that were of concern to the CIA.

From Meet the Press Sunday morning:

Tenet: … We, we said, very clearly, there are three areas of concern: contact, safe haven and training. We documented that in a paper in January of 2003, January 28 of 2003. We also said that, to the best of our knowledge, this may have been no more than two organizations seeking to take advantage of each other, and we could see no complicity, no operational relationship, no command and control between Iraq and al-Qaeda.

It could be noted here that there was no suggestion after 9/11 that the Taliban had any command and control or operational relationship with al Qaeda either. “Contact, safe haven, and training” were broadly viewed as enough justification to invade Afghanistan.

And from an October, 2002 letter from Tenet to U.S. Senators, right before the Senate vote for the Iraq War Resolution, cited by Tim Russert:

One, We have solid reporting of senior level contact between Iraq and al-Qaeda going back a decade.” Two, “Credible information indicates that Iraq and al-Qaeda have discussed safe haven and reciprocal” aggression.” Three, “Since Operation Enduring Freedom, we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of al-Qaeda members, including some that have been in Baghdad.” And lastly, “We have credible reporting that al-Qaeda leaders sought contacts in Iraq who could help them acquire WMD capabilities. The reporting also stated that Iraq has provided training to al-Qaeda members in the areas of poisons and gases and making conventional bombs.”

And Tenet’s answer:

… We believed those points, but we also believed–and everybody in the administration understood–that we never found complicity, authority direction and control, and said that very explicitly.

Democrats may argue those contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda weren’t enough to be concerned about, but they are not telling the truth when they claim the Iraq war has nothing at all to do with the larger war on terror or when they imply that President Bush made up a connection.

On WMD, Tenet said he had no doubt Iraq had the weapons. There was some disagreement among analysts about various details of the Iraqi programs, such as how soon they could develop a nuclear weapon, but there was “no doubt” they had the intent and the capability to develop one, and there was no doubt they had chemical and biological weapons. They were wrong, but the CIA being wrong about any number of things does not even suggest “Bush lied”, let alone demonstrate it.

From Meet the Press yesterday:

Tenet: … We told you exactly what we believed about weapons of mass destruction. We believed he had chemical and biological weapons. We believed he, he was reconstituting a nuclear program but he was five to seven years away. That’s what we believed. That’s what we said.

President Bush and his administration can be criticized for many things (going into Iraq with too few troops would be Exhibit A here). But the charge of lying us into war, when what he did was believe his CIA Director and the consensus view of the intelligence community, is not one of them. And those making the charge – Reid, Pelosi, Kerry, Edwards, etc. – know full well what they’re saying is not true.

As Mario Loyola argued in an excellent article at National Review Online, the burden of proof was not on the United States to prove Saddam Hussein had WMD. The burden of proof was on Saddam Hussein to prove he did not have WMD. He refused to do so, therefore President Bush acted, and was manifestly justified in acting. The objective was to end Iraqi WMD capability; that objective was met because President Bush acted.

As for the Democrats’ continual lament about “America’s reputation in the world” being damaged, perhaps if they had not continually repeated the “Bush lied us into war” slander, our reputation in the world would be better. Perhaps if they had stood unified with their nation at war, instead of doing such things as comparing our troops to Stalin and Pol Pot, our reputation would be better. Perhaps now, given the evidence they are lying, if they stopped repeating their slanders, our reputation would improve again. We don’t claim America’s reputation abroad is entirely determined by Democratic talking points, but it is certain they don’t help.