Harry Reid pulled the plug on an effort to get the DREAM act passed in the defense authorization bill:

"We will move to proceed to this matter before we leave here. I"m going to do my utmost to do it by November 16," Mr. Reid, Nevada Democrat, said last night.

The proposal faced strong opposition from Republicans who objected to mixing immigration with the defense bill and who vowed to filibuster to defeat the measure if Democrats insisted on bringing it up now.

The atmosphere around any kind of immigration reform is extremely poisonous. The flaw of this bill is in the proof of residency, as this Heritage report tells us:

There is no upper age limit. Any illegal alien can walk into a U.S. Customs and Immigration Ser­vices office and declare that he is eligible. For example, a 45 year old can claim that he illegally entered the United States 30 years ago at the age of 15. There is no requirement that the alien prove that he entered the United States at the claimed time by providing particular documents. The DREAM Act's Section 4(a) merely requires him to "demonstrate" that he is eligible-which in practice could mean simply making a sworn statement to that effect. Thus, it is an invitation for just about every illegal alien to fraudulently claim the amnesty.

There might be a good law waiting to be made around the idea of a pass to illegal aliens who broke the law through the actions of their parents and not on their own accord. But this isn't it.

Reid and the other Democrats may give this another go, but without key Republicans and the White House on board, it's probably a lost cause for them.

New York Governor Eliot Spitzer was known as a man who wouldn't back down from a fight while serving as attorney general for the state. He went after corporations (his favorite targets) including: insurance, record and financial firms. He stuck it to the man at every opportunity like a good anti-Capitalist.

Now, as governor, he has the opportunity to stop crime by doing nothing, just letting a law on the books stand. But no, Spitzer has gain street cred with the other Dems and try to increase his vote among Hispanics by changing a law that stopped illegal immigrants from getting driver's licenses:

The change rolls back rules adopted four years ago under the Pataki administration that made it difficult, if not impossible, for tens of thousands of immigrants to obtain driver's licenses because they could not prove legal status. Under the new rules, the Department of Motor Vehicles will accept a current foreign passport as proof of identity without also requiring a valid yearlong visa or other evidence of legal immigration.

Just a question, governor: didn't at least three of the ten men in two planes kill thousands of people in your biggest city overstay their visas? They all had passports as I recall, so your little plan here would not have caught them.

It's coming folks, the individual states are making their moves to subvert federal law and pass their own amnesty plans. The same party that freaks out every time someone suggests that abortion should be decided by the states will have no issue with states acting on this issue. They couldn't care less about the national security implications or even the implications to local security, as long as it gets them more votes and keeps them in power, it's all good.

Spitzer has his eye on a run at the presidency and he's being a good soldier for the real leadership in New York, Hillary Clinton and Chuckie Schumer. They are the power players and whatever they want, Spitzer will give them. Keep that in mind when he runs in 2012 or 2016.

From time to time I've given Rudy Giuliani a hard time on this blog for a variety of stances that my former mayor has taken of late. Today, I happen to agree with him. But boy, oh boy, the conservative wing of the GOP is not going to be happy about what Mr. Giuliani said in his interview with blow-hard Glenn Beck .

GLENN: Right. But isn't illegal immigration a crime in and of itself?

GIULIANI: No.

GLENN: Aren't you saying--

GIULIANI: Glenn--

GLENN: You're protecting criminals by saying that being treated as a criminal is unfair.

GIULIANI: Glenn, it's not a crime. I know that's very hard for people to understand, but it's not a federal crime.

GLENN: It's a misdemeanor but if you've been nailed, it is a crime. If you've been nailed, ship back and come back, it is a crime.

GIULIANI: Glenn, being an illegal immigrant, the 400,000 were not prosecuted for crimes by the federal government, nor could they be. I was U.S. attorney in the southern district of New York. So believe me, I know this. In fact, when you throw an immigrant out of the country, it's not a criminal proceeding. It's a civil proceeding.

GLENN: It is--

GIULIANI: One of the things that congress wanted to do a year ago is make it a crime, which indicates that it isn't.

GLENN: Should it be?

GIULIANI: Should it be? No, it shouldn't be because the government wouldn't be able to prosecute it. We couldn't prosecute 12 million people.

Waiting for the YouTube file to add to this, but I'm happy to hear a GOP candidate talk some sense about immigration. And how, do you suppose, the base will respond to Rudy saying that we shouldn't make crossing the border a federal crime?

Arizona will implement the one of the the toughest immigration laws in the country come October. That law would pull the business license of a business owner who employs illegals, ten days for the first offense and permanently for the second.

With that law on the horizon, illegals are packing up, selling their property and heading elsewhere. My guess is not back to Mexico but probably to Texas, California or New Mexico:

The state's strong economy has been a magnet for illegal immigrants for years. But a growing number are pulling up stakes out of fear they will be jobless come Jan. 1, when the law takes effect. The departures are drawing cheers from immigration hard-liners and alarm from business owners already seeing a drop in sales.

It's impossible to count how many undocumented immigrants have fled because of the new law. But based on interviews with undocumented immigrants, immigrant advocates, community leaders and real-estate agents, at least several hundred have left since Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano signed the bill on July 2. There are an estimated 500,000 illegal immigrants in Arizona.

It will be interesting to see how this effects the Arizona economy, unemployment rate and overall job market. I imagine the economy will take a short-term hit as employers are forced to pay legal immigrants and citizens more but the market tends to settle those things out. The true numbers to watch will be the ones that how much the state saves in health care costs and other costs associated. I would imagine schools will be less populated but the savings associated with that will tougher to calculate.

The success or failure of this bill is going to have a strong ripple effect as to where the nation as a whole goes. It's interesting to note that this is happening in John McCain's state, so evidently he was going against the wishes of his constituents by supporting the shamnesty bill.

Captain Ed has more.

New Jersey is a deep blue state (John Kerry won by 7% in 2004 and Al Gore by almost 16% in 2000) where the political machine rules. Political bosses wield enormous power and those bosses are all Democrats. I wouldn't say New Jersey is liberal like, say, Manhattan. It's a state that is blue-collar, union and affluent at the same time, old school Democratic in other words.

That said, it's surprising that the attorney general of the Garden State passed down that the immigration status of those arrested will be established by the arresting officers:

It's just seven pages long. But Directive No. 2007-3 could fundamentally change the lives of New Jersey's immigrant population.

On Friday, civil rights and immigrant advocates expressed deep concerns about a mandate that police ask citizenship status of those arrested for indictable crimes, such as theft, rape and assault, along with drunken driving in New Jersey.

Many said they support the spirit behind state Attorney General Anne Milgram's decision to create a transparent statewide system for police handling of immigration status. They responded positively to a provision barring police from asking victims and witnesses about their status.

This is a reaction to the horrific execution deaths of three college-bound kids behind a school in Newark, a city not far from Manhattan. The alleged leader is a man named Jose Carranza, an illegal immigrant from Nicaragua.

In a recent OpEd piece, the Wall Street Journal has decided to chastise the GOP base regarding their anti-illegal immigration stance by essentially stating such a position will lead to massive election losses in 2008.

"[F]or every base Republican who is gratified by talk of ID cards and border patrols, there's an entire family of Hispanic immigrants who are absorbing the mean language of "sanctuary cities," "lawbreakers" and "deportation." Many of these folks are religious, entrepreneurial, and true believers in the American dream; as such, they're the biggest new voting potential the Republican Party has seen in ages. But a growing number, just like those Catholics of yore, are angered by the recent rhetoric and wondering why they should pull a lever for any party that would go out of its way to tag their community as the source of America's problems." (Source: Wall Street Journal)

Ultimately, the real question here is whether or not immigration law will be enforced or if it will be dissolved or ignored. Unfortunately, the Wall Street Journal has become the voice of greedy business interests who are now addicted to cheap labor. This is a shame as such a position has created a huge fissure in the GOP that the negative effects will be slow to heal.

Immigration will be an important issue in the 2008 elections and Republicans may just have an issue to top the Democrats:

Fifty-eight percent (58%) of voters nationwide favor cutting off federal funds for "sanctuary cities" that offer protection to illegal immigrants. A Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that just 29% are opposed. Republican Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney proposed such a plan earlier this week.

By a 71% to 16% margin, voters also favor a proposal that would require all foreign visitors to carry a universal identification card as proposed by another GOP Presidential hopeful, Rudy Giuliani. Seventy-four percent (74%) also favor the creation and funding of a central database to track all foreign visitors in the United States.

Those are serious numbers and ones that the GOP can use to further the issue of securing the border and finally forcing Congress to deal with the immigration problem.

In the last week, we saw Newark, NJ Mayor Corey Booker (follow the link and see what unlikely groups are saying "enough!") defend his policy of not asking or investigating the immigration status of those they arrest in the midst of an illegal alien with a long criminal history (including rape of a five-year old) executing three college students behind a school. The story was big all over the country and the immigration issue was given more exposure.

The Democrats should be asked what their thoughts are and the answers will be interesting as they will have to pander to the Hispanic base while not going so far as to say anything that will be usable in the general election.

For a more detailed list of crimes committed by illegals, see Patterico.

It has been going on for a week. A battle for conservative hearts and minds (and votes) that pits two formerly liberal-minded candidates, Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani, against one another. The subject of the debate, illegal immigration, is especially hilarious, given that both candidates only recently discovered that they were so against it.

At campaign stops and in Op-Ed pieces written by surrogates, Rudy and Mitt seek to portray the other man as the one who turned a blind eye to the many illegal aliens who populated New York City and Massachusetts during his rival's tenure in office. How pathetic and transparent can these guys get?

"They are trying to rattle their sabers louder than the other and thump on their chests," said Angela Kelley, the deputy director of the pro-immigrant National Immigration Forum. "Both of these guys are trying to remake themselves."

And they are demonstrating truly horrible leadership qualities in the process. Why should any voter believe what these two guys say?

This is not good:

A criminal investigations report says several U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services employees are accused of aiding Islamic extremists with identification fraud and of exploiting the visa system for personal gain.

The confidential 2006 USCIS report said that despite the severity of the potential security breaches, most are not investigated "due to lack of resources" in the agency's internal affairs department.

The USCIS is a division of Homeland Security and is tasked with immigration and naturalization petitions as well as refugees and asylum requests. The fact that they are not investigated because of a lack of resources is a cop out.

They could (and should) coordinate with other agencies within DHS to conduct a proper, thorough investigation and bring those who have broken the law up on charges. Why haven't they? Because, just like every other federal agency, they protect their own so that the Department Heads don't look bad.

The U.S. government and workforce can do anything we put our minds to. Why would the Border Patrol have to resort to asking for volunteers from its ranks to finish construction of 70-miles of fence then?

The U.S. Border Patrol is asking for volunteers among its agents to help build fences on the U.S.-Mexico border, even as President Bush is withdrawing half the National Guard troops he sent there last year to build fences.

A memo circulated last week to Border Patrol sector chiefs said fence-building efforts on the Southwest border were going to fall short of Mr. Bush's goal of finishing 70 miles in fiscal 2007, which ends Sept. 30, "so the Border Patrol is now going back into the fence-building business."

I work with many companies are capable of putting in 70 miles of fencing in less than a month. Why can't the federal government procure the services of qualified construction companies and have them start on both sides and meet in the middle like they did with trans-continental rail system? The answer, of course, is thatPresident Bush doesn't want to seal the border, to the increasing ire of conservatives everywhere.

The Drug Enforcement Agency has released a report detailing the connection between Mexican drug gangs and middle-eastern terrorists:

Islamic extremists embedded in the United States - posing as Hispanic nationals - are partnering with violent Mexican drug gangs to finance terror networks in the Middle East, according to a Drug Enforcement Administration report.

"Since drug traffickers and terrorists operate in a clandestine environment, both groups utilize similar methodologies to function ... all lend themselves to facilitation and are among the essential elements that may contribute to the successful conclusion of a catastrophic event by terrorists," said the confidential report, a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Times.

The 2005 report outlines an ongoing scheme in which multiple Middle Eastern drug-trafficking and terrorist cells operating in the U.S. fund terror networks overseas, aided by established Mexican cartels with highly sophisticated trafficking routes.

From a purely business standpoint, this makes absolute sense for the cartels as they are highly adept at working in the shadows. They also know every single smuggling route into the U.S. through our porous border.

In case you missed it, a funny article appeared in this weekend's LA Times chronicling the advent of a new political phenomenon. In a merger of sports and politics, the Nevada State Democratic Party is now sponsoring an adult soccer team, dubbed Los Democratas. Why? Hispanic voter outreach. You see, the league, Unidas, has some 10,000 players, most of them Latino, and that means a whole lot of fans.

It's a rapidly expanding pool of potential voters. An influx of Latinos over the last 15 years has helped make Las Vegas one of the fastest-growing regions in the country; they account for about 25% of the state's residents. But for two key demographic reasons--age and citizen status--Latinos account for 12.5% of Nevada's eligible voters, according to a Pew Hispanic Center analysis of the U.S. Census Bureau's 2005 American Community Survey.

It's a community oriented approach, and Democratic volunteers turn up at the games with voter registration forms. While this is an interesting idea, I worry that it will lead to the corruption of the soccer league itself. How long can it be before a team is renamed Los Republicanas? Then each party will start pouring in more and more money to acquire the best players. We'll have naming-rights battles for soccer fields. And what will become of the non-partisan Guanacos team? No, while it's smart for Democrats to continue reaching out to Hispanics, it's best to keep politics out of sports.

Hazleton, Pa. has been an epicenter of the immigration debate. Mayor Lou Barletta led the nation in doing what the federal government wouldn't do -- enforce laws against illegal immigrants who use services they don't pay for and cost taxpayers millions of dollars. Today, the courts told Mayor Barletta that he had to stop doing what was right and go back to ignoring those who are in violation of our laws:

A U.S. judge on Thursday struck down as unconstitutional a local law designed to crack down on illegal immigration, dealing a blow to similar laws passed by dozens of towns and cities across the country.

U.S. District Judge James Munley said the city of Hazleton, 100 miles north of Philadelphia, was not allowed to implement a law that would fine businesses that hire illegal immigrants and penalize landlords who rent rooms to them.

No word on those towns who actually break the law and offer safe havens for illegals. They're OK in the eyes of civil rights groups.

This is not just an issue in San Diego or El Paso, this is a problem in suburban Philadelphia and upstate New York. This is a real issue affecting real people and they're getting sick of it.

Taegan Goddard's Political Wire points us to something I missed in my post a few days ago about Congress' 14% approval rating in the latest Zogby Poll. That is how the voters viewed both Congress and the president on the immigration issue. Again, Zogby polls left, and the position of the majority of the activists on the Left and of President Bush were nearly identical, at least when the bill was introduced. Bush's position didn't change during the debate, while the Left in Congress (led by the unions, originally supporters of amnesty) gradually took the view that the bill wasn't generous enough to illegals. Regardless, the response of the voters to everyone was abysmal -- and Congress once again polled worse than the president:

A Zogby Interactive survey in the midst of the wrangling over that bill showed Congress' job approval rating specifically in its handling of immigration reform stood at just 3%, while Bush's rating on the same subject stood at 9%.

Let's do a bit of very non-scientific analysis spin musing on this result. I highly doubt that the voters who disapproved of the handling of the immigration bill that came before Congress hated it because they favored open borders and no enforcement. As other polls seem to suggest that nearly everyone thinks that illegal immigration is a problem, that tells me that an incremental solution, as opposed to the "comprehensive" solution offered by Congress, is the way to go. Whichever party in Congress first proposes to strengthen immigration policies and close loopholes, while at the same time saying to the voters that if we can prove to them that we can control our borders some sort of an amnesty program would and must follow in another legislative year, will be the ultimate winner in this debate.

Senator John Cornyn (Republican) is now asking President Bush (Republican) why he can pardon his friend Scooter Libby while allowing two border patrol agents, Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean, to serve 10 year sentences for shooting a drug smuggler. His statement today from National Review Online:

"I am deeply concerned with some of the information that came to light at today's Committee hearing today. Among other things, it would appear that the government allowed this drug dealer to violate the terms of his immunity agreement with impunity. Further, it would appear that this drug dealer was allowed to commit perjury with impunity. I would also note that several jurors have since come forward to state that evidence which they were prevented from hearing would have changed their verdict. I have serious concerns with the government's decision to suppress certain information from this jury. Finally, I am perhaps most concerned with the very excessive prison terms that were handed down to these two individuals.

"Agents Ramos and Compean were on the front lines; their duty was to enforce our immigration laws and protect this nation. The prosecutors had a duty to dispense equal justice under the law. It seems to me an open question whether Agents Ramos and Compean were treated differently because of their status as law enforcement officers. What I do know, however, is that if the Scooter Libby case is one which the President believes was excessive then I have a hard time understanding why these two individuals would not warrant a similar review."

This issue has been smoldering in the background of conservative ranks for awhile now, but I am surprised that a high profile Republican senator has been willing to challenge the administration on this. That's a good thing, but a little surprising that it's a Republican. Where are the Democrats on this issue? This is a golden opportunity for them to contrast the presidents pardoning of a friend of his while letting two hispanic federal agents rot in prison. Are the Democrats more concerned about the rights of illegal immigrant drug smugglers? I doubt it, yet so far only Dianne Feinstein has latched on to this issue. That should change and this issue may blow up at any time.