Have the Republicans Found Their Cover?

Immigration. It stirs strong emotions. Many more people turned out to protest immigration reform, particularly Telediagnosis Frist's draconian measures to stop 'em at the border and ship 'em back across. The Republican measure would have made it a crime to teach an illegal immigrant child, to provide her social services, to feed her unless she were starving. I could go to jail for helping someone change their tire. And the debate comes at a most opportune time to steer attention away from the many failures of Republican rule.

Take ethics. The party that brought you K-Street, Jack Abramoff and Tom Delay today voted to reject an office of public ethics for the Senate, stating they can police themselves. We've seen how well that works. Since they gutted the existing ethics committee to take pressure off Senate Republican leaders, they seem to think that independent oversight of the Senate is something so plebian, so common, so beneath our elected lords and masters. So we, under the cover of immigration reform, are going to receive a gutless reform bill that does little to stem the sale of the Republican congress to the highest bidder.