Cal Thomas asks an interesting question after writing in the NY Sun this morning:
A former senator and probable Republican presidential candidate, Fred Thompson, brought Virginia Republicans to their feet last Saturday night in Richmond when he said the public no longer believes in politicians who promise to secure the U.S. border as part of a bipartisan immigration bill.
“You’ve got to secure the border first, before you do anything,” Mr. Thompson said. “The members (of Congress) say it’s right here in this bill: the border. The response is, ‘We don’t care what’s on a piece of paper — secure the border.’ The piece of paper doesn’t secure the border.”
Mr. Thompson claimed the bill now being debated in the Senate is “the same deal” offered in the 1986 amnesty: legalization of aliens in exchange for border security. He said the public won’t be fooled again.
When Mr. Thompson speaks of distrusting Washington politicians, he is including Republicans and President Bush, who in recent weeks — in company with members of his administration — have taken to labeling opponents of the bill xenophobes and nativists, even suggesting some are racists.
Read the rest and his question then ask yourself the same thing.
I agree that the public will not be fooled again. Yet it remains to be seen if they just stand on the track announcing a train is coming until it passes or step off in sufficient numbers to derail it.
[Ed. — A later thought: Better still, every state holds a primary and there are 520 days until Election Day. I think we need to stop voicing our displeasure and send something a whole lot larger back down that track.]