Clearly, the Americans, or at least those who trooped to the polls and let their voices be heard, are tired of the GOP, which swept to power in 1994. Those who have been saying that they were always right got it all wrong, including disgraced former house speaker Tom DeLay who said that the Democrats didn’t win. The Republicans lost. There is probably a good basis for that. However, it should also occur to them that perhaps the Republican base has had enough of corruption, ethical malpractices, and overconfidence on the part of the Bush administration, and because the Americans want to bring the troops home from Iraq.
The results of the elections are also a repudiation on the claim that a victory of the democrats means a win by the terrorists. No stupid American would, democrat or not, would subscribe to that idea. It’s just dumb. Didn’t they know that even if they are liberals, they are still Americans?; that the Constitution must be upheld even to those who want to harm us?; and that they should have been more morally responsible in their conduct whether political or personal?
As of Wednesday, we have learned that the Senate has fallen into the hands of the Democrats. Thus, a House and Senate under the Democrats make Bush a lameduck president, who has already started cleansing his administration with the replacement of Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld with former CIA Director Robert Gates as perhaps a sign that he, finally, is starting to listen. The best move the president has done this early, as we should all leave the elections behind and start fresh.
Here at Diaryo Pilipino and the rest of the Filipino-American community, we hope that with a Democratic leadership in the House of Representatives, an immigration reform will eventually pass. We expect that undocumented immigrants will be able to come out of the shadows and be legalized. As for the others, a guest worker program being advanced by President Bush will also be a welcome respite for those who cannot even get an ID, drive a vehicle and open a bank account because they cannot secure a valid social security number.
Of course, there is much to be done as far as the immigration reform is concerned. Many Americans favored the border fence and they also have reservations in granting amnesty to undocumented immigrants, which is how they translate the immigration reform. They may not have said it in Tuesday’s elections as Iraq seemed to be the primary concern of the voters, but there is clear indication that there are also a lot of Americans who understand that undocumented immigrants are no terror threat.
In addition, many anti-immigrant lawmakers have been reelected, including Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo and Wisconsin Rep. James Sensenbrener, the latter authored the bill that classified illegal immigrants as criminals. Tancredo has shown that he is angry at these immigrants, especially after holding massive rallies in Chicago and Los Angeles, and was the most influential in the passage of the border fence bill and for blocking President Bush’s immigration reform.
In Arizona, four propositions were approved overwhelmingly, all anti-immigrant measures, even if the people behind them didn’t make any appeals to the voters, let alone a single TV advertisement. On the other hand, however, the association of American immigration lawyers is more bullish that they think that eventually a comprehensive immigration reform will become a reality sooner than later. They actually “celebrated day and night,” when I asked an immigration lawyer on their reaction to Tuesday’s mid-term elections, specifically on the matter of immigration reform. I guess they know better.
We shouldn’t rejoice just yet. We have to remind our newly-elected lawmakers that the time has come for a real immigration reform.(RFL)
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