There is a huge difference between a majority of conservatives, and a majority of republicans. As I've been trying to point out, these are not the same.
Let us say for example, that roughly 11% of the republicans are not conservative. That would still be a vast majority (89%) that were against Amnesty. However, in the 109th Congress from 2005 to 2007, the republicans only held the senate with 55 to 45.
The democrats, as noted above, are almost uniformly for Amnesty. Thus if only 11% of the republicans are closet liberals, that would tip the vote 49 to 51, wouldn't it?
That might sound far fetched, but when you consider McCain, Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, and Arlen Specter, which are nothing more than democrats who run around with republican name badges, it's not hard to imagine two more joining the crowed.
In other words, republicans might hold the majority, but that doesn't always mean conservatives do.
Not exactly. A lot of people do not know what was, or is in the Immigration Reform Bill. Technically it's still in the bill, since the bill could be brought up for debate any day. The bill was never killed. It passed the senate, and is in waiting to be discussed in the House.
But to the point at hand, the bill did include Amnesty, which is why people went nutz over it. However, it also had a lot of other things too.
- Border Tunnel Prevention Act, which would allow the government to give stiff penalties for trying to build a tunnel under the boarder, with fees and confiscation of property to those who finance it.
- Border Law Enforcement Relief Act of 2006, provides money to pay for boarder patrols.
- Makes it unlawful to knowingly hire, recruit, or refer for a fee an unauthorized alien.
- Border Infrastructure and Technology Modernization Act which would provide for the fence and other infrastructure to secure the boarder, including electronic detection.
- An employer compliance fund, to push businesses for complying with immigration laws.
So, there was a real attempt by some to fix this problem. I should note that, in 2007 when the democrats came into power, another Amnesty bill was sent up for debate. Unlike the republican bill, this bill was simply an Amnesty bill. No attempt was made to fix the problem at all.
