Immigration enforcement

It's been a long time coming... Wes Pruden notes rumors from the government and in the business community of a coming crackdown on employers who hire illegals.

Somebody may be pouting at the White House over the collapse of the comprehensive amnesty legislation.

For seven years, the Bush administration has been unable or unwilling to enforce the immigration laws, leading to an out-of-control deluge of illegal aliens across the nation's Southern border. Suddenly, the feds are about to do what they said couldn't be done. ...

Enforcing the law is always a good thing to do, and a late conversion is better than no conversion at all. The federal government has always enforced the laws it wanted to enforce. You could ask segregationist school boards across the South of a generation ago. So the sudden White House enthusiasm for enforcing immigration law, doing what they said couldn't be done, inevitably raises suspicions about why now. Maybe, say curious minds who want to know, there's a spiteful message here to the millions of Americans who so unceremoniously put the president and his allies in Congress smartly in their place with the collapse of the immigration bill. Rarely has the Washington political establishment been so rudely - and effectively - slapped across the face and told to remember that public servants are, after all, servants of an impatient and long-suffering public. Lessons like this sting and smart, and the pols don't like to be reminded of who they actually are. So the reply is rough and blunt: "You want enforcement? We'll give you enforcement."

Do we want enforcement? Yes, please.

Meanwhile, local governments that have tried to take care of the problem that the feds woudln't deal with have been shot down by a federal court.

Given that the judge in question is a Clinton appointee, it serves, once again, to bring into sharp focus just how important it is to have a President that will appoint judges to the bench who actually understand our Constitution - and don't make it up as they go along.

Here's hoping this one goes to the SCOTUS.

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