June 28, 2007

We Win, They Lose (Redux)

Cloture fails to get 60 votes, in fact it fails to get a majority, and loses 46-53

Senator Ted Kennedy showed true class in defeat, saying opponents of his bill were in favor of a "gestapo."

Now all we need, as the Turks say, is three more horseshoes, and a horse

So, who should be punished? How about Senator Lindsey Lohan Graham (R-SC) for demonizing his fellow Republicans as racists? Suggestions, please.


My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer

22 comments:

Ron Guhname said...

We should drive out of office every one of these Republicans Senators (who voted yes today):

Bennett (R-UT)
Craig (R-ID)
Graham (R-SC)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hagel (R-NE)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Lott (R-MS)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McCain (R-AZ)
Snowe (R-ME)
Specter (R-PA)

No self-respecting conservative should support McCain for Pres. (Do any these days?) He needs to be embarassed that he thought he could be a Republican President.
We also need to "deal with" Trent Lott.

Anonymous said...

If I may be a bit crude, it is absolutely wonderful to see Tamar Jabobin, err Jacoby, kicked in the balls.

We have come out of this battle in a stronger position in terms of the war for ideas.

Many restrictionist ideas that I never thought would go mainstream have indeed gone mainstream in the establishment conservative world thanks in no small measure to the Axis of Amnesty's now defeated Operation Barbarossa.

For instance,

1) Although the Grand Compromisers used it as a figleaf to sneak in amnesty, the fact that Kyl even proposed to end Chain Migration is big progress.

The Heritage Foundation and other conventional conservatives like Frum now support cutting chain migration except for spouses and minor children.

2) The Heritage Foundation has come out in favor of ending birth right citizenship.

Beforehand only politically isolated blogs supported challenging anchor baby citizenship.

To have an establishment organization like Heritage come out in support of ending anchor baby citizenship is key to increasing the percentage of American babies that are white (My estimate is that ending citizenship for anchors would push the percentage of white babies born in the US to 63% from 55%.)

3) Many conservative organizations and columnists now want to increase the level of education needed to immigrate to the US and to cut back on unskilled legal immigration based on economic arguments.

4) Some establishment conservatives like Hewitt are expressing concerns over importing Muslims.

We still need to make progress on the need to massively cut legal immigration, but there can be no doubt that the intellectual momentum is moving towards us thanks to El Fuhrer Grande.

Old Right

Anonymous said...

Ron Guhname,

Yes, the Twelve Apostles of Arbusto's Amnesty need to be thrown out of office. Let us also not forget Senator Switchback.

Finally, the fine folks at Ace of Spades have been working on some great parody pictures.

Here are a few of my favorites. Enjoy!

[1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13]

Anonymous said...

How about we start a campaign to drop Mitch McDonnell and replace him with DeMint or Sessions?

Two for one behavioral conditioning. Lose power for being bad, gain power for being good. All through a single action. And I think that's much better than only going for the stick here. We need champions as much as examples.

Besides, it's pretty darn hard for a current party leader to resist this type of campaigning because all of his Bruti get to say, "Ahh, c'mon, it's for the good of the team" and he knows they have rock-solid political cover for their own ambitions.

Anonymous said...

We go after the leadership.

Let's not just punish, let's give a tasty carrot to those who'll hit our now obvious foes with a stick for us.

That said: Sessions for minority leader with McConnell getting the heave-ho?

Anonymous said...

Anonymous here.

The 7:37 comment was before the internet connection drop, and the 7:46 was the rewrite.

Same guy, not someone doing a bad job stuffing the comment box.

Of course, the later comment proves I should just think a second before typing.

Anonymous said...

I hate Grahamnesty even more than McCain.

Lindsey was by far the most obnoxious character during this entire conflagration - no meager achievment.

South Carolinians need to find a primary challenger ASAP, or failing that, vote for the Democrat.

A Democrat could not possibly be worse than Graham.

Old Right

Anonymous said...

Graham for sure. Michelle Malkin nicknamed him Senator Hissy, and if you listened to his whining and condescending lecturing, its a very apt name.

Anonymous said...

Re: Tamar Jacoby: She wants to say that we are racists. The argument to use against her is to say that she is ugly. I am serious. Give my arugment and her standard one some thought.

Let her prove that her ugliness has not been the motivating factor in her pro illegal-alien stance. It is that ugliness and its natural expression in wanting to destroy something as a cry against the injustice of her own ugliness that motivates her. I know we are all suppose to hide from that fact, but we should not. Her ugly-ism is the motivating factor of her destructive immigration views. I don't think those on either side of the argument want ugly-ism to rule the day. Tamar Jacoby stop the ugliness.
sN

Anonymous said...

The "gestapo" link shows, almost unbelievably, people described as "day laborers" waiting outside the Senate chamber during the vote. Are they actually illegal immigrants/workers? Sitting right there in the Senate chamber while Kennedy is talking about a "gestapo"?

eh

Anonymous said...

Some establishment conservatives like Hewitt are expressing concerns over importing Muslims.

Banning Muslim immigration is the next domino to fall in the PC wall. I used to be scared by the PC police, but I now have no compunction about saying that Muslim immigration needs to stop - completely.

I recently had family visiting from the DC area, and one of them was telling me how bad the security has gotten in the Capitol and environs (not to mention travelling). I responded by pointing out that we have two choices: accepting a police state, or limiting Muslim immigration.


We go after the leadership. Let's not just punish, let's give a tasty carrot to those who'll hit our now obvious foes with a stick for us.

The leadership typically gets replaced following an electoral defeat. McConnell was the minority whip before the 2006 elections, but he didn't take the blame for defeat. When Republicans lose Senate seats - AGAIN! - in 2008, how can the GOP refuse to punish McConnell and Lott for their stupidity?

As for Bob Bennett: he's not up for re-election until 2010. He's getting old, so I'm not sure he'll run again. His son ran for a state senate seat in my district - and lost (came in only 3rd place in the county convention, in fact - so he didn't even make it into the primary). There's another family political dynasty that's dead.

When Bennett ran for re-eletion in 2004, none of his advertisements brought up issues. They just made fun of his funny looks. Nice to know that our Senators take their jobs so seriously, ain't it?

Anonymous said...

What about getting our politicians to implement the The Secure Fence Act of 2006? Congress passed it by an overwhelming margin last year; the President signed it; let's pressure them to actually build the fence.

Steve, Kaus, and other bloggers on this issue should have weekly progress reports e-mailed to them from folks who live near where the fence is supposed to be being built, with digital photos showing what, if anything, has been built.

Anonymous said...

Guys,

I was just as outraged as the next guy during this thing, but what we need now is to be magnanimous in victory for most of 'em, since simply from a practical perspective, they're serviceable as restrictionist votes in the future.

Of course, a few Senate-critters are beyond forgiveness on this. McCain and Graham, especially, need to be cast into the void ASAP. They distinguished themselves as shameless demagogues in this and they went out of their way to make it clear they're not on our side.

As for the rest of them, they can be rehabilitated, especially the ones who voted based on cowardly political weathervaning. Of course most senators are cowards in that regard. The trick is making sure they stay afraid of us.

Kyl is a special case. He actually has pretty good restrictionist impulses, but I think he was suckered into this thing by being in on the writing process. There's a kind of madness that tends to overtake parlimentarians who have a hand in crafting legislation. I think Kyl figured he would try to take a bad situation and make it as least bad as possible by being in on the process, and over the course of many months of tweaking hundreds of clauses here and there, he missed the forest for the trees.

The main point is, aside from McCain and his lapdog Graham, the GOP senators will follow the perceived political momentum, and right now that's on our side, and we need to keep them there rather than write them all off.

Anonymous said...

As for the rest of them, they can be rehabilitated, especially the ones who voted based on cowardly political weathervaning.

I disagree. These guys will make up an excuse to support amnesty in the future if they feel they can pass it and weather the storm of public anger before election season. This was Judgment Day and if they didn't listen to the public even as the senatorial phone system collapsed, then they can never be expected to listen to the public. McCain and Graham must be destroyed, but the following are obviously beyond any rehabilitation as well: Hagel, Martinez, Specter. Additionally, Lugar seems to have been a surprisingly staunch supporter of amnesty during this whole affair. He needs to be tossed. Lott also needs to be thrown out as an object lesson to would-be arrogant pricks in the future. Lott is a disgrace in too many ways. Switchback must go also. The guy is an amnesty supporter at heart. He will hurt us if he is given another opportunity.

Frankly, my thinking runs opposite to yours, Russell: I think there are even more opportunists who will stab us in the back than the Twelve Apostles of Amnesty and Switchback. McConnell and Voinovich appear to have voted against cloture simply because it had already failed.

I say to hell with every single vulture who voted for this cloture and to Switchback, Voinovich, and McConnell. We should go after as many as possible.

Anonymous said...

I'm an observer from Germany. Clearly, multiculturalism emanated from the USA, and was installed in Europe after WWII in order to combat the perceived ethnicism which lead to the Nazis.

However, the Nazis simply abused the ethnicity which has always been central to European nations.
The only way the madness of Muslim immigration to countries such as Germany will end, is when the formal policy of multiculturalism in the USA ends. Then perhaps the Afrikaners in South Africa can have their homeland without fear of being sanctioned by fellow whites, something unheard of amongst other races. That's why this is of interest to me.

Bush had a white face yesterday. I have never seen him with such a complexion on any issue before. It only proves that Steve was right: Amnesty was the centerpiece of his presidency.

Anonymous said...

"I was just as outraged as the next guy during this thing, but what we need now is to be magnanimous in victory for most of 'em, since simply from a practical perspective, they're serviceable as restrictionist votes in the future."

I'm not so sure. If an employee of yours (which the senate is) has not stolen from you, only because you caught him with his hand in the till before he could get away with the loot, you wouldn't exactly call him an honest, trustworthy employee, would you?

The characters of these men have een revealed. It's time for a purge.

Anonymous said...

Graham would be the best scalp. I think all the Grand Bargaineers should suffer for it, but nationally there needs to be a focus and Graham is the logical choice (that and torpedoing McCain's campaign).

Anonymous said...

I was just as outraged as the next guy during this thing, but what we need now is to be magnanimous in victory for most of 'em, since simply from a practical perspective, they're serviceable as restrictionist votes in the future.

True. We need the carrot and the stick. A simple thing to do right now would be to call or email your Senators who voted against cloture and thank them. Same with leaders like Sessions, De-Mint, Cornyn, and Inhofe.

If your representative voted for the House GOP Caucus condemnation of the immigration bill, thank them too.

Carrots work. Politicians lap up praise like a dog laps water.

Jewish Atheist said...

How about Senator Lindsey Lohan Graham (R-SC) for demonizing his fellow Republicans as racists?

Coming from the blogger with perhaps the largest contingent of overtly racist readers, that's pretty funny. One doesn't have to be a racist to be against the immigration bill, but a lot of folks here sure are.

Anonymous said...

...what we need now is to be magnanimous in victory for most of 'em, since simply from a practical perspective, they're serviceable as restrictionist votes in the future. As for the rest of them, they can be rehabilitated...The trick is making sure they stay afraid of us...The main point is, aside from McCain and his lapdog Graham, the GOP senators will follow the perceived political momentum, and right now that's on our side, and we need to keep them there rather than write them all off. - russell

I only wish. That may be true in some cases, but the fact is that for many of them it's all about friends, cronies, and contributors - and the fact that they're just arrogant, out-of-touch SOBs. That's all there is to it.

So, yes, be diplomatic. Yes, be nice. But when a chance comes to replace them, Republican or Democrat, replace them. We won the vote against a huge amnesty bill. But as Mark Krikorian said over st The Corner, all this means is that they'll revert to gutting enforcement laws in little ways - gutting funding here, tiny laws with big effects (like granting endless appeals to illegals) there. That's what they did after 1986, and it's worked well you have to admit.

It was clear all along that a majority of the Senate wanted open borders. Just because they lost doesn't mean they still do. If we want a Senate that supports a sane policy we're still gunna have to replace a lot of these guys.

Anonymous said...

Uh, Jewish Atheist, your name cracks me up because I'm half Jewish and an atheist. Yet, call me crazy but somehow, just somehow, I don't find this place to be hotbed of racism.

Here's an easy crib note you might want to scribble on your hand, when people talk about race, they might not be racists, they might just be talking about race.

Of course, as this site often deals with human biodiversity (oh, the horrors of science when applied humans!), I feel inclined to point out that my good half is Ashkenazi.

And you, Shephardic?

Anonymous said...

I agree with Tommy: With maybe a couple exceptions like Bond, I don't think immigration restrictionists can trust anyone who voted "yes" on Monday and switched to "no" on Thursday.
Perhaps Steve and David Frum can kiss and make up over shared scorn for Trent Lott.