Pity poor Lindsey Graham. Ok, well, don't pity him – rather, snicker at him for his stupidity in becoming the latest Republican senator to get caught up the crossfire of Democrat mid-term electoral calculations.
Mr. Graham, of course, is the Senator from South Carolina who styles himself as the second coming of the now former "maverick", Arizona Senator John McCain. (McCain, we recently discovered, is now an ex-Maverick, having recently disavowed having ever been anything but a loyal conservative Republican in the face of a strong GOP primary challenge from former congressman J.D. Hayworth.)
Senator Graham has spent the last six months engaged in a negotiation with Democrat Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts and "independent" (but really Democrat) Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut on "climate", i.e., cap and trade legislation. Keeping with the hubris of their massive egos, these three senators have proceeded on the belief that they, and only they, can devise the ideal solution to the non-existent "problem" of man-caused global warming, with Sen. Graham taking on McCain's former role as the poster child for Republican-in-name-only (RINO) stupidity.
The Kerry/Graham/Lieberman bill – we'll call it KGL for short – was set for a grand unveiling this past Monday, but a funny thing happened on the way to Lindsey's coronation: Democrat election year politics intervened. On Saturday, poor Lindsey issued a plaintive message announcing he was pulling out of his negotiations on the KGL bill – meaning, one supposes, that we will have to henceforth refer to it as simply the KL bill – due to the fact that the White House has now convinced Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to take up immigration reform rather than "climate" legislation next on the senate's agenda. Graham's note went on to express his disappointment that the Democrats have chosen to yet again delay dealing with such a critical issue, after they had promised him that KGL would be next on this year's agenda.
Oh me, oh my, what is a poor RINO to do?
The only surprising thing about this shift in Democrat strategy is that it comes as a surprise to anyone, much less Sen. RINO. The Democrat agenda is never about dealing with issues that are somehow important to the American people. If it was, healthcare would have been far down the list of priorities, and "climate" wouldn't even be on the list. After all, large majorities of the public adamantly opposed the healthcare atrocity, and that majority has continued to grow since the bill's passage, and "climate" legislation consistently places dead last in polls that ask respondents to the issues that are most important to them. In most polls, it wouldn't even register as an issue at all unless the questioner specifically asks about it.
Immigration, on the other hand, does register in the collective public mind, and so, as the Democrat leadership in Washington looked at this year's remaining congressional schedule, and realized they were quickly running out of days on which issues could be brought to the well of the Senate for consideration, they had a choice to make. Not surprisingly, they made the choice that they perceive will give them the greatest political advantage in November. Despite Sen. RINO's complaints, it was an entirely rational choice.
For the Democrats, "climate" legislation is about one thing and one thing only: placating the radical leftist "environmental" groups who contribute tens of millions of dollars to Democrat campaigns. But while the radical greens control gobs of money, they don't control a lot of votes at the end of the day, and they can just as easily be placated through the regulatory processes at EPA and the Department of the Interior as they can through legislation. So, although they give great lip service to it, for the Democrats, "climate" legislation is really a secondary priority, especially in an election year.
Immigration reform, on the other hand, is where the votes are. One of the great looming problems the Democrats face in this year's elections is a great deficit in what pollsters call "voter enthusiasm". The
Democrat voter base always tends to experience lower turnout in mid-term congressional election years, and that is only exacerbated in years, like this year, when the Democrat voter base – made up largely of ethnic minorities – is less motivated to vote than the GOP voter base.
So, facing this election-year reality, the Democrat leadership in the White House and congress made the very cynical and simple calculation: What better way to stir up the voter base than with a big fight over immigration reform? It doesn't matter to the Democrats if they win or lose, it makes no difference whether a bill is ultimately signed into law or not – the fight is what matters in an election year.
So, the Arizona immigration bill that was passed late last week gave the President and Sen. Reid their opening, and they jumped through it, with Sen. RINO becoming the big loser in the whole process.
Gosh, don't you feel terrible for poor Lindsey?
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