US Senate flexes its super-powers

The U.S. Senate leaps into action! Since the bounty of $25 million on Osama Bin Laden's head has had zero effect in leading to his capture, the Senate votes to double it. Hey, twice the dollars, twice the success, right?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate on Friday voted to double the bounty on Osama bin Laden to $50 million and require President George W. Bush to refocus on capturing him after reports al Qaeda is gaining strength.

By a vote of 87-1, the Senate set the reward for the killing or capture, or information leading to the capture, of the mastermind of the September 11 attacks on the United States.

Critics of Bush's "global war on terror" have accused him of putting too much emphasis on Iraq, which had no known connection to the September 11 attacks, at the expense of efforts to get bin Laden and dismantle al Qaeda.

Right. Killing hundreds of al-Qaeda members in Iraq has nothing to do with dismantling al-Qaeda. And the thousands of NATO troops in Afghanistan have been ignoring the hunt for Bin Laden.

But the added money, and more importantly, reports to Congress, will do the trick -- this time, for sure!

Sen. Byron Dorgan, also a North Dakota Democrat, said more important than the bounty was the legislation's requirement that the administration give Congress classified reports on the hunt for al Qaeda leaders every 90 days....

Citing reports that bin Laden could be in a secure hideaway in Pakistan, Dorgan said, "There should not be one square inch on this planet" that is safe for bin Laden.

Sen. Jim Bunning, the Kentucky Republican who cast the only vote against raising the bounty, said catching al Qaeda leaders already was a "top priority." In a slap at Democrats, he added, "If Senator Dorgan truly supported our efforts to fight al Qaeda he would not support withdrawing from Iraq, a key battleground against al Qaeda and in the war on terror."

Of course, Congress could declare war on Pakistan and give the President the green light to invade the Northwest Frontier and Tribal Areas of that country to hunt down Bin Laden. The Pakistanis might, however, take exception -- and they do have nuclear weapons.

It's worth noting that at long last, Pakistan's President Musharraf has been forced into taking action against Islamic radicals in his country. That may lead to the Pakistani military pushing Bin Laden out of his safe haven in Pakistan's northwest and into the waiting arms of the NATO forces in Afghanistan. Better to promote this strategy than pretend that money will somehow solve the problem.

Of course, if Bin Laden is truly imaginative (as he always has proven to be), he might see this new reward level as a fundraising opportunity. He could allow a sympathizer to turn him in, knowing that the end result will be the US Congress giving al-Qaeda a $50 million cash injection.

On the other hand, I don't understand why the Democrats in Congress don't simply pass a law making it illegal for Bin Laden to remain in hiding. While they're at it, they could pass another law requiring al-Qaeda to redeploy from Iraq within 120 days. I'm sure that in their minds, it's just that simple.

Leahy: Al-Qaeda terrorists = Japanese-Americans

Senility is not an attractive quality in United States Senators.

Two top US Senators on Tuesday urged lawmakers to back their drive to restore basic legal rights to inmates of the US "war on terror" camp at Guantanamo Bay.

The bill, an amendment to a defense funding measure being debated in the Senate, would restore the writ of Habeas Corpus to camp inmates -- which would allow the accused to challenge their detention in a US court.

"Like the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, the elimination of habeas rights was an action driven by fear, and it was a stain on America's reputation in the world," said Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee.

Several hundred inmates at the notorious camp in Cuba were deprived of the right, which legal and human rights activists say is a fundamental underpinning of justice, by a bill passed when Congress was in Republican hands last year.

Senator Arlen Specter, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, is co-sponsoring the move, which is expected to face a challenge from a dueling amendment, also from the Republican side.

"If we lose the basic fundamental rights to require evidence before somebody is held in detention, if we lose the right of habeas corpus, it is a very sad day in America," Specter said.

So Senator Leahy is equating al-Qaeda terrorists with Japanese-American internees? How interesting. Perhaps someone should point out to the good Senator that the detainees at Guantanamo are accused of something more than merely being of a certain race or national origin. Whereas the Japanese-American internees were rounded up based on a fear of what they might do because of who they were, the Guantanamo detainees are in custody for what they have already done.

Senator Specter is equally demented. "We" haven't lost the right of habeas corpus. Guantanamo was selected for the purpose of detaining enemy combatants precisely because it isn't in America. And if we have to start treating enemy combatants as criminal defendants, perhaps we had better require our troops in the field to Mirandize the enemy before shooting them.

There is one other interesting point. Despite what the U.S. government did to Japanese-Americans by interning them in relocation camps, a fair number of young men in those camps responded by volunteering for service in the U.S. Army in the Fighting 442nd Nisei brigade, fighting with valor in Europe. Sen. Leahy can ask his colleague Daniel Inouye of Hawaii about his experience in the Nisei Brigade. And then they can ponder, along with Sen. Specter and all of the other Senators so tenderly concerned for the detainees at Guantanamo, why it is that Muslim-Americans did not volunteer in droves in the aftermath of 9/11 to form an Islamic version of the Fighting 442nd.

The best immigration bill that can pass (this) Congress

On Tuesday in Texas, John McCain spoke again of his comprehensive immigration reform bill:

"I think it's a matter of national security," McCain said, "and to do nothing — to leave the status quo — would be an abrogation of our responsibilities to the American people."

McCain, speaking amid a series of fundraisers in Houston, added, "If they've got another proposal that will pass the Congress of the United States, then let's hear that."

Let's detour to Monday in Oklahoma, where McCain expanded on the national security theme:

"We have 12 million people. We don't know where they are or what they're doing," McCain said to reporters after speaking to members of the Oklahoma House. "We've got to secure our borders."

McCain said he met with Oklahoma lawmakers who supported sweeping state immigration legislation that Gov. Brad Henry signed into law on May 8. Among other things, the measure would deny most public benefits to illegal aliens, target employers who hire illegal aliens and provide protections to citizens and legal immigrants who lose their jobs to illegal immigrants.

"They passed that legislation because they were frustrated, understandably. The federal government did not carry out its responsibilities," McCain said.

He said border control is a federal responsibility. "That means fences, that means walls," McCain said.

If our national security is at stake (and it is), then that's what ought to be fixed first and foremost, before anyone worries about "normalizing" illegal aliens. McCain's grand compromise pretends to put border security -- "fences and walls," along with electronic employment eligibility verification and other measures -- ahead of normalization by making the vaunted Z-visa contingent on the "trigger" of implementation of these security measures.

However, between the time the bill becomes law and the time the trigger measures are in place, illegal aliens will have a provisional authorization to work and travel -- so who needs a Z-visa? Moreover, the provisional status becomes valid if a background check doesn't show up anything unusual -- by the end of the next business day. Doesn't allow for much time to turn up anything on the applicant, does it? Of course, the more extensive background check that follows the "instant read" will be more reliable and no doubt won't take too much longer to complete, right?

`(1) IN GENERAL- An alien who files an application under subsection (a)(1)(A) for adjustment of status, including a spouse or child who files for adjustment of status under subsection (b)--

`(A) shall be granted employment authorization pending final adjudication of the alien's application for adjustment of status;

`(B) shall be granted permission to travel abroad pursuant to regulation pending final adjudication of the alien's application for adjustment of status;

`(C) shall not be detained, determined inadmissible or deportable, or removed pending final adjudication of the alien's application for adjustment of status, unless the alien commits an act which renders the alien ineligible for such adjustment of status; and

`(D) shall not be considered an unauthorized alien as defined in section 274A(i) until such time as employment authorization under subparagraph (A) is denied.

All of which applies, of course, only to those aliens who come forward to apply. What of those who don't meet the requirements for application, or who have good reasons -- say, a criminal background or terrorist connections -- not to apply? There seems to be no provision in this bill for those folks.

McCain is right that allowing the status quo to continue is an abrogation of Congress's duties. He is also right that this bill is probably the best that can pass the current Congress. But what he fails to see is that the appropriate action is not to pass this bill, but to change the composition of Congress to get one that can pass a real border security bill on its own merits.

If Senators like Ted Kennedy are willing to hold border security hostage as a bargaining chip to get benefits for illegal aliens, they should be required to make that strategy clear to the American electorate. Not all of them would get turfed out in 2008, but it's likely enough of them would that we might finally get a Congress able and willing to implement border security. Then, and only then, should we deal with the question of absorption of the most anodyne of the illegal aliens currently in the US -- as well as the identification and disposition of all of the other illegal aliens currently here.