Reaching for a deal, or just refusing to die?

Randall Parker at Parapundit quotes this from the AP:

Key Republican and Democratic senators are reaching for a deal to resurrect their stalled immigration compromise by requiring that some $4 billion be spent on border security and workplace enforcement.

This is an example of what I see as the overstatement in recent mainstream news coverage of the attempted revival of S. 1348. “Reaching for a deal” makes it sound as if all the parties are in the same room, are desirous of a deal, and just have to clear away a couple of remaining obstacles and they will have the deal. But that is not what is happening. What is happening is that the leading supporters of amnesty keep coming up with one formula (or one threat) after another that they hope will convince (or intimidate) GOP senators to sign on to an agreement that will persuade Sen. Reid to bring the bill back to the floor; but there is no such agreement in sight. If such an agreement were in sight, we would not have been hearing about some new proffered formula (or threat) every day for the last three days. There are ideas being floated, but, as far as I can see, they are not getting anywhere. That is not the same as senators “reaching for a deal.”

For us to stay vigilant and ready to launch a full-scale telephone campaign at a moment’s notice is one thing; for us to remain in a state of constant panic and agitation is something else, and will only exhaust us.

At the same time, we must recognize from the way the other side refuses to let go, refuses to accept the American public’s rejection of this bill, that this bill is not like other bills. The impulse that drives its supporters is not normal, but demonic. They will keep trying to resurrect it as long as they are able. They are going after their own special “Beast” moment, the event that occurs in Revelations Chapter 13 after the beast, unto whom the dragon has given great power on earth, receives a terrible wound:

And I saw as it were one of his heads wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him?

This devilish parody of the Resurrection of Christ gives the beast even greater power than he had had before the wound to awe men into submission. That is what the supporters of S.1348, the Comprehensive Black Death Act, feel they will have accomplished, if, after the apparently mortal wound their bill has received, they can bring it back to life.

But let us also remember that the beast is finally destroyed.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at June 14, 2007 06:36 PM | Send