Gordon Smith: No On Cloture
Plus Crumbling Homestate Support For Lindsay Grahamnesty

Now Gordon Smith, another wobbler, tips over to "no" on cloture.

Have I missed any of the wobblers tipping the other way yet?

Can I hope for a cascade here? Many Democrats politicians are conflicted about this bill, a little due to the negative effects of on the wages of American workers they're supposed to be oh-so-concerned about, but mostly because they fear that if they vote for this without sufficient bipartisan cover from Republicans they'll have this immensely unpopular bill hung 'round their necks for the next three or four or ten election cycles.

With so many of the cover-providing Republicans announcing their intent to vote against cloture, will the wobbling Dems have the stones to push the bill through?

Perhaps they're content to let the Republicans do the dirty work of killing the bill by voting against cloture, so they can say they were all in favor of voting for the bill had it reached the floor (assuming the bill could be sufficiently "improved" to be even more generous towards illegals, of course!).

In news I'm sure will shock you all, the highly-technological "virtual fence" has been delayed yet again due to... um, technological problems. And to the open borders crowd that pushes this nonsense on us, of course, those technological problems aren't a bug, they're a feature!

Technical issues are delaying the completion of a multibillion-dollar high-tech fence intended to reduce illegal entry along the nation's southern border, the government said Thursday.

Some lawmakers are questioning why Boeing Co., the lead contractor, and staff at the Department of Homeland Security waited until a day after a hearing earlier this month to update Congress on the delay.

The first phase of the project involves building nine towers that are dotted along 28 miles of the Arizona-Mexico border, and bracket the Sasabe, Ariz., port of entry.

Nine towers... for 28 miles of border.

Err, exactly how tall are these towers supposed to be? Each tower would have to be pretty tall to command a view of of, what, about 1.5 miles in each direction, right?

Yes, they're supposed to have radar. And of course we all know that radar can easily discriminate between four-legged coyotes and two-legged coyotes without the need for visual confirmation. Especially radar scanning the ground. Not as if there are terrain features that might block or spoof radar signals or anything like that.

Correction: Tall Enough? A commenter says they're supposed to be 98 feet tall, and another commenter says -- I feel a little dumb -- that a 4 foot child can easily see 1.5 miles. Well, yeah -- I guess I got a little carried away there. I guess I did sort of forget that I have little problem seeing that far.

...

At the hearing on June 7, no problems or delays on so-called Project 28 were mentioned. But the next day DHS officials notified congressional staff of a one-week lag due to radar problems, according to a letter questioning how and when Congress was informed.

The letter was sent Tuesday to DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff by House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D-Calif., chair of subcommittee that held the hearing.

"It is unacceptable that the department chose to disclose this information via telephone to committee staff, rather than providing a thorough assessment of the project's status directly to committee members at the hearing," the letter says.

Loretta Sanchez is more concerned about border enforcement than the Bush Administration. Think on that.

Why The Virtual Fence Won't Work: I believe I already linked this, but See-Dub tears up the "virtual fence" worse than Trent Lott's goats.

posted by Ace at 03:17 PM

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