Politics Blog

Cue the fat lady:

John McCain’s campaign, trailing top Republican rivals in money and polls, is undergoing a significant reorganization with staff cuts in every department, officials with knowledge of the shake-up said Monday.
Some 50 staffers or more are being let go, and senior aides will be subject to pay cuts as the Arizona senator’s campaign bows to the reality of six months of subpar fundraising, these officials said.

They spoke on the condition of anonymity because the plans have not been made public. An afternoon conference call was scheduled to announce the results of second-quarter fundraising.

We’ll soon be saying “good riddance” to the arrogant, stubborn, and condescending “maverick” John McCain. While amnesty was the final nail in his coffin, I’ll always resent him more for the blatantly un-Constitutional McCain-Feingold bill.

Did you notice how Lindsey took the spotlight away from McCain on the last round of amnesty in order to help minimize the association of McCain with his own putrid bill? Too little, too late.

— W.C. Varones

And we all know that the only thing Democrats care about are poll numbers, that and what the French think of them. Upon returning from the 4th of July recess, Democrats in both the House and Senate, responding to slumping poll numbers, will refocus on Iraq:

WASHINGTON – With the immigration bill dead, troop withdrawal deadlines vetoed, and other high-profile initiatives stalled, Democratic leaders closed six months in control of Congress mired in low approval ratings and plotting a legislative blitz on an issue they once tried to escape: Iraq.

Over the weekend, Reid called on Republicans to support legislation that will force the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq. Starting next week, Democrats are planning weekly votes on the issue.

“Too many times, Republicans have stood in the way of progress instead of helping us lead the way,” Reid said Saturday in the party’s weekly radio address.

While some Republicans are “saying the right things on Iraq,” they need to back up their words with votes. . . . Voting against a bill on a matter of principle is one thing,” Reid said. “To go forward, we will need far more Republicans to put partisan politics aside and work with us for the American people.”

While seeking their votes on the war, Reid accused GOP lawmakers of deliberately blocking ethics reform and enactment of the 9/11 Commission recommendations.

Democrats encouraged by Republicans joining with them in calling for a surrender, I mean withdrawal:

Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana , a Republican, yesterday called for a bipartisan approach to scale back the US military involvement in Iraq.

Lugar was one of two Republican senators who declared last week that Bush’s Iraq strategy was not working and that the US should downsize the military’s role.

He was joined by Senator George Voinovich, Republican of Ohio.

Appearing on CBS’s “Face the Nation” yesterday, Lugar said Bush should consult Democrats and Republicans on a new strategy that includes ongoing talks with all Iraq’s neighbors. Lugar has resisted Democratic calls for a deadline on troop withdrawal.

– ‘The Commish’ A.J. Sparxx

Looks like this one could use a few more minutes on the barbie:

Police officers hold down one of the badly-burned men outside the Glasgow arrivals hall moments after he had set himself alight

Story here.

— W.C. Varones

I’ve found my parents to be good representatives of mainstream Republican voters. They are moderate Republicans, differing sometimes on issues but rarely voting Democrat in general elections. They live in a red county in a blue state, and follow political news casually. They have never seen a political blog. They don’t listen to right-wing radio.

Visiting my parents this weekend, I was surprised by how well they understood the immigration bill, and by how vehemently they were opposed to it. The rewarding of lawbreakers was a big issue, but even bigger was the deception: “this is not amnesty.” They were offended and insulted that Bush/Kennedy/McCain would lie so blatantly about a bill that was obviously amnesty.

People don’t want to be lied to. Reagan’s amnesty was a bad idea (certainly at least in hindsight), but at least he didn’t say it wasn’t amnesty.

— W.C. Varones

Over the weekened, DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff said that 370 miles of border fencing would be completed by the end of 2008.

— PoliPundit

Scott Rasmussen’s simple analysis:

The final Rasmussen Reports national telephone poll before the vote found that just 22% of Americans supported the legislation. No amount of Presidential persuasion, Senate logrolling, and procedural tricks was able to overcome that solid bi-partisan lack of public support (although it’s breathtaking to consider how close a determined leadership could come to passing such an unpopular bill).

The real mystery in all of this is why the Senators and their cheerleaders didn’t anticipate the public response. Perhaps they fell in love with their own rhetoric and forgot how it might sound to others.

Near the end of the debate, supporters of the doomed legislation often stated that the status quo is unacceptable. Most Americans would agree on that point. In fact, they might even hold that feeling more strongly than the Grand Bargainers of the Senate–72% of American voters believe it’s Very Important to reduce illegal immigration and enforce the borders. But controlling the border was never a focal point of the Senate debate. Instead, the Senators spent most of the time debating the fine points of various approaches to legalizing those who are here illegally. For voters, those topics were definitely a second-or-third tier aspect of the issue.

Because the Senators and the White House never showed much enthusiasm for reducing illegal immigration, only 16% believed the Senate bill would accomplish that goal. Forty-one percent (41%) thought passage of the legislation would actually lead to more illegal immigration. In other words, even though voters consider the status quo unacceptable, they had every confidence that Congress could make a bad situation worse.

It is impossible to overstate the significance of this basic fact. Outside of 46 Senators, hardly anybody thought the legislation would work. That’s why it was defeated. It wasn’t amnesty or guest-worker programs or paths to citizenship that doomed the bill. Each of those provisions made it more difficult for some segments of the population to accept. However, a majority would have accepted them as part of a true compromise that actually gained control of the border.

— PoliPundit

Amnesty supporter Fred Barnes, on senatorial motives:

The excuses some senators used to explain their “no” votes and mask their political motives were laughably lame. Harkin said he feared some workers could have been denied jobs “because of errors in a government database.” Republican Pete Domenici of New Mexico told the New York Times that the supposed secrecy in which the bill was drafted created confusion and “caused it to flop.” Actually the bipartisan drafting sessions were widely reported and attended by more than a dozen senators. Domenici is up for reelection next year.

Republican Sam Brownback of Kansas switched his vote during the roll call from yes to no. “The country’s not ready,” he told the Washington Times in justifying his reversal. “I thought we were, but just concluded the country’s not ready.” Brownback voted for a more liberal immigration bill last year. This year he’s seeking the Republican presidential nomination.

Susan Collins rarely splits with her Maine colleague Olympia Snowe, but on immigration she did. She said the bill didn’t strike the right balance. “People were troubled by the proposed solution for the 12 million people here illegally,” she said. Collins is running for reelection next year. Snowe isn’t.

Whatever the tactical explanations, it’s clear that public opinion forced these senators - and some other senators - to vote no.

— PoliPundit

Fox News has been one of the staunchest supporters of amnesty. Their silencing of dissenting voices was taken to such ludicrous extremes that last Sunday Fox News Sunday had on two amnesty supporters - Senators Trent Lott (R-MS) and Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) - “debating” the Bush-Kennedy bill.

This week was no different, with DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff - a Bush minion and supporter of amnesty - “discussing” immigration with host Chris Wallace.

Here’s an interesting part of their exchange about the fence:

Wallace: Congress passed the Secure Fence Act in October of last year, mandating construction of 700 miles of new fence along the southwest border. Now Congressman Duncan Hunter, who comes from that part of the world - comes from San Diego - says that in fact, in the eight months since then, that the government has built only 13 miles of new fencing. Is that true sir?

Chertoff: Well what we’ve done is we’re working on - and we’ll complete by September - up to 140-150 miles of fencing. As anybody who’s ever built a fence or a wall knows, Chris, you don’t build it one mile at a time. You take a chunk - like for example the 35 miles at the Barry Goldwater range in Arizona - you have to level the ground, you have to put a foundation in, you have to drive in the pillars, and then you put the fencing in. So in that case, for example, we’re going to go from a handful of miles to 35 miles within a couple of months. We’re on track to get about 370 miles done by the end of 2008.

It’s very encouraging that Chertoff has committed to build 370 miles of fence by 2008.

But what are the other tools he needs?

But I do have to say that, for people who believe that the answer is just fence, yesterday we discovered a tunnel; so fencing is not the cure-all for the problem at the border. We’ve got 40 percent of our illegals coming through the ports of entry, using legal visas, and overstaying.

…

We haven’t been able to require every employer to enter a system in which they check the work status of their employees, to determine whether they’re illegal. And without that, we don’t really have the ability to enforce the law with respect to illegal work in this country in a way that’s truly effective. And that would be the single greatest additional weapon we could use if we’re serious about tackling this problem.

Indeed, mandatory employment verification is a laudable goal, and one that I’ve been pushing for three years, starting when the president first announced his support for amnesty in January 2004.

The Social Security Administration put a verification system in place in 2005, which over 15,000 employers are now using. The easiest way for the Bush administration to give Chertoff most of what he wants is to require all federal contractors to use the system. This can be done by the Executive branch, without having to push new legislation through Congress. And, if the president wants to ask Congress to pass laws requiring all employers to use the system, we’ll be glad to help out there as well.

— PoliPundit

Staggering:

ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos Reports: A source close to Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., says his presidential campaign raised more than $30 million during the second quarter, which ended yesterday.

That figure tops Obama’s haul during the first quarter of the year, when he reported raising $25.8 million.

Official figures have not yet been released by Obama’s rivals for the Democratic nomination, although the campaign of Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., had said it expected to raise about $27 million during the quarter, and the campaign of former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., had publicly set a goal of $9 million.

UPDATE: It’s official. $32.5 million

— PoliPundit