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April 07, 2009 12:42 AM UTC

SB 170 defeated in the Senate

  • 85 Comments
  • by: Awen

(Bwok…Bwok….Bwok…. – promoted by Laughing Boy)

POLS UPDATE #2: Sen. Morgan Carroll blogs on her no vote:

I cannot support SB 170 in a climate where the state is cutting or eliminating over $1 billion of benefits to the people and is facing a $300 million cut to higher education, which virtually ends higher education as we know it in the State of Colorado.

The plight of children who have done nothing wrong nor know no other country as home is a real one but would not be solved by this bill because under current federal law they remain at risk for deportation and have no lawful path to employment.  Federal immigration reform is desperately needed to bring a real solution to this and many other problems.  The process for legal immigration in this country is broken and needs to be fixed.

SB 170 identifies a real problem but does not provide the solution.  I believe the bill is currently at odds with federal law and brings a real risk of the state being sued – and losing.

POLS UPDATE: As the Denver Post reports:

The Colorado Senate today narrowly rejected a bill that would have allowed illegal immigrants in-state tuition after five Democrats joined with Republicans to vote against it…

Controversy had followed the legislation, Senate Bill 170, from its introduction all the way to the Senate floor. The bill only made it out of the Senate Appropriations Committee last week after Democrats called a meeting in the absence of one Republican member on the committee, setting off angry accusations from GOP senators that Democrats had pulled a sneaky maneuver to get the bill approved.

Today, though, Democrats delayed debate on the bill long enough to allow Sen. Jennifer Veiga, D-Denver, to make it back from the airport to participate in the debate.

Sen. Ted Harvey, the Republican who was absent from last week’s appropriations committee meeting to care for an ailing family member, sarcastically applauded Democratic leadership for waiting for Veiga’s arrival.

“I think it’s great that we’re getting back to the premise of senatorial courtesy,” said Harvey, R-Highlands Ranch.

There many places to start post-morteming the failure of Senate Bill 170. First and foremost are the massive budget cuts proposed for higher education that came to light at the end of last week, which tremendously complicated any attempt to increase the burden on Colorado colleges–even if this bill ultimately wouldn’t have like proponents insisted. You can argue about the DREAM Act and the potential for federal dollars all you want to: you’re immediately set against the basic sensibilities of too many voters, who just heard the words “30% tuition increase.”

Second was the end run around Sen. Ted Harvey last week, which has been vigorously defended on dense procedural grounds, but with more of a grin today after they held up the whole Senate to politely await Sen. Jennifer Veiga (above story). We, um, don’t really mind seeing the majority roll like the majority gets to, but the story of that little maneuver was not exactly framing out well for the instigators–and on a hot-button issue like this it would have guaranteed controversy straight into the next election cycle.

Third? Well, you’ve got a Hispanic community that is already kind of, we don’t know of a nicer way to say this, used to being put out on the margins when the GOP’s always-ready rhetoric starts looking like it might have purchase. That really is the only way to explain, for example, certain Democrats who voted for this a couple of years ago and against it today. The politically expedient benefit outweighed the risk. It sucks, and it’s not political calculus we would depend on for very much longer. But it is what it is. Original post follows.

UPDATED: Five Democrats voted with the 13 Republicans: Linda Newell (Englewood), Lois Tochtrop (Adams County), Jim Isgar (Hesperus) and of course, Moe Keller. The final vote was 16-18. There was a Republican absent but I don’t know who.

The bill, as has been noted by others, would have provided instate tuition rates to undocumented high school students.

(and thanks to Droll who suggested updating the diary; I didn’t know I could until a few minutes ago.)

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85 thoughts on “SB 170 defeated in the Senate”

    1. I could be wrong, but based on the count she either voted for it or was absent. There were 16 Dems who voted for it and four who voted against and one absent. I don’t know who was absent.

  2. The Post is reporting that five Democrats voted against it. The math doesn’t add up quite right – but if that’s true Carroll could have been the fifth.

      1. Peter Groff gave one of the most impassioned speeches I’ve ever heard him give. Brandon Schafer apologized to Ted Harvey, taking blame in part for the goofball tactics in Senate Approps last week. It was Harvey’s motion during the committee of the whole report to do a roll call vote, and that’s when it was killed. There apparently was one Republican absent, not one Democrat, so that makes it five Democrats who voted with the Republicans. The debate today lasted just over three hours: Republicans calling for senators to uphold the law; Democrats calling for fair treatment of children who are in this country over no fault of their own.  

  4. Sen. Joyce Foster, a Denver Democrat who is the descendant of Jewish immigrants, invoked the Holocaust and appealed to senators’ compassion.

    Are you fucking kidding me?  You know what would be like the Holocaust?  If we rounded up all the illegal immigrants and relocating them to death camps.

    Let’s see, more expensive college, shot in front of a mass grave nearly starved to death.  Hmm.

    1. I don’t think Sen. Foster’s comparison was as wildly out-of-bounds as you perceive it to be. First of all, it was (probably) a reference to our refusal to accept Jewish refugees fleeing from the Holocaust (and thus effectually condemning them to death), rather than an insinuation that denying in-state tuition to undocumented immigrants is similar to perpetrating a Holocaust. So, the first take-home point of the comparison is that it was our actual immigration policy that condemned a boat load of Jewish refugees to death in Nazi concentration camps.

      Second, the comparison may have been intended to point out that we have a history of basing our immigration policies on our labor needs rather than on humanitarian concerns, and that it is a policy habit of which, looking back, we don’t have a lot of reason to be proud. In the Mexican immigration context, we have systematically encouraged the influx of disposable workers throughout our history, trying to turn on and off the spigot at our convenience, and it is arguable that we have a moral obligation to offer those who have flowed through as a result reasonable opportunities to succeed through their own efforts.

      You’re right, of course, that there is a huge difference in degree between being deprived access to a college education and being returned to Nazi Germany to be exterminated. But, since we have done both, and are continuing to do one, and both involve indifference to the humanity of those who come here fleeing difficult circumstances in search of safety and opportunity, maybe it’s not such an absurd comparison after all.

      1. I didn’t hear the speech, but I’ve heard from people there.  Sounds to me like a heart string puller.  I sent an email asking for sure, I’ll let you know if she responds.

        In the meantime, I’m not willing to take a historical examination for granted.  Some of our people throw around Holocaust metaphors like Easter candy.  99x out of 100, it’s exactly what I think.

        Way to tie it together though. 🙂

          1. When I hear people complain about Christian holidays taking over I always think of Reese’s peanut butter filled eggs.  I’ve had two the size of half an ostrich egg, so a whole egg.  Sure my pants got a little tight, I still don’t regret it.

            1. finding the hidden Matzah!

              When I was a kid, I asked my mom why we didn’t have a Christmas tree. The answer: “Because we’re Jewish!” Here’s what I think: A Christmas tree is a Germanic pagan contribution to a holiday set to coincide with the Roman Saturnalia (you know, as in “discretion is the better part of valor”?), celebrating a religion which synthesizes Hebrew religion and Greek philosophy. If it doesn’t offend Christians to use a pagan germanic symbol as part of the celebratation of the main festival of a Helenized version of Judaism set to coincide with a pagan Roman holiday, then it doesn’t offend me as a Jew to join the party.

      2. Foster’s comparison WAS a reference to Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust – specifically, the 1939 ocean liner St. Louis “Voyage of the Damned” incident in which 930 Jewish refugees were denied entry into Cuba and the United States and eventually wound up back in Germany, where they died in the camps. Foster talked about this at length during her remarks today, and their wanderings were what she linked to undocumented immigrants.

      3. to US refusal to take in Jewish refugees, sometimes turning ships around to send people  back to certain and often very drawn out horrific death is more than a tad over the top as well. Refusing in state tuition is not at all comparable.  

        This is something reasonable people can disagree on and, as a Jewish person, I think we really ought to avoid screaming “holocaust” or accusing people of being Nazis over things that simply aren’t on the same plane. Foster was out of line to say such a thing.  

        1. HERE’s something that actually does bear comparison. American doctors betraying the Hippocratic oath assisting in torture at Gitmo:

          http://www.washingtonpost.com/…

          Yeah, refusing in state tuition is just as bad for sure.

          Oh and I’m not even against this legislation. Just really tired of people using the holocaust this way.  

        2. is certainly overdone, and often done very inappropriately, but, as with all cliches, there’s actually a good reason for it: Nazism, Hitler, and the Holocaust have become archetypes.

          As for making comparisons between things of different magnitudes, well, that’s not only appropriate, it is often why the comparison is of any value in the first place:

          http://coloradopols.com/showCo…

          A comparison between two things that are identical is not a comparison, it is an identification. There must be differences, and the differences very often are of magnitude: “Football is like war,” or “War is hell” (one wonders what hell would have to be compared to?).

          I think it’s a good idea to avoid absolute rules, like “any comparison to Nazis, Hitler, or the Holocaust, that doesn’t involve a genocidal totalitarian regime, its genocidal dictator, or the the victims of the genocide, is off-limits.” There were other instructive aspects to Nazi Germany.

          In this case, the comparison wasn’t to Nazi Germany, but rather to previous American policy, which interracted with the atrocities in Nazi Germany. The point (and I believe a valid one) is that there are moral consequences to our policies that are to some extent created by what is happening beyond our borders, and we have done a very poor job of taking those consequences into account. To make that point, it makes perfect sense to bring up one of the most dramatic examples. Again, if you study the history of American Immigration Law, you are left more with the sense that refusal of Jewish refugees was emblematic of our historical norm rather than some exceptional event.

          1. I just find it offensive.  Equating things of vastly different magnitude, not only in scope but in degree, is not the same as merely comparing.  Comparing recognizes the difference. Equating doesn’t.

            Masses getting hacked to death in Rwanda, starved and tortured to death in Cambodia, the genocide of the Armenians, those kinds of things can be equated with the holocaust even though they don’t represent events on quite as large a scale.  Not everyone can be as efficient as the Germans.  

            Trying to legally and/or illegally move to a different place for better economic opportunity is just normal human business as usual.  Do we really have to indulge in such shabby hyperbole to debate the situation on its own merits?  Personally, I’d prefer not.  

            1. but from how it was depicted here, I didn’t gather that it involved equating denying tuition to undocumented immigrants with committing genocide. In fact, as I guessed and someone confirmed, she wasn’t even comparing it to genocide at all, but rather to our historical act of turning people away who faced genocide.

              I don’t really have any stake one way or another, but I do not consider some Pavlovian response of aversion to any mention of the Holocaust for comparative purposes to be any more productive than a Pavlovian response that involves mentioning the Holocaust every time there is some injustice the speaker wants to amplify in magnitude. Both are dysfunctional. As with most things, the appropriateness of how and when one uses such a reference is entirely dependent on how when it is used.

              Maybe if I listened to exactly what she said, I would end up agreeing with you. But, from what I’ve seen, I have no basis for jumping to that conclusion. That’s just me. We can agree to disagree.

                1. And, in fact, they’re facing entrenched poverty here in the United States, imposed by our own policies.

                  That’s the nature of comparison: To compare one thing to another. Love is not war, war is not hell, geneologies are not trees. Comparisons depend on a combination of difference, sometimes vast difference, and similarity, sometimes subtle or slight similarity. To point out the difference and claim that it is an argument for the inappropriateness of the comparison is a fallacy, since there are significant differences to be pointed out in all comparisons.

                  The question isn’t whether the differences are vast, or the situations entirely different, but rather whether the similarity to which the comparison is trying to draw attention is an authentic similarity. In this case, it is the comparison between the immigration policy of several decades ago which was deaf to the humanity of those who whom that policy discarded, and the immigration policy of today that is deaf to the humanity of those whom this policy discards. I consider that an authentic similarity.

                  1. You can use all the sociological lingo you want.  You’re still all wet on this one. Rarely is anything of any use ever accomplished or any reasonable political debate ever furthered by playing the Holocaust/Nazi card.  If a friend is about to go there I’d say “please shut up right now” just as I would take car keys from a drunk friend.  Promise that’s my last word on the subject. Sociologize away!  

                    1. I’ve made my arguments, by any name. And, in fact, in the past, I’ve argued your position in this debate more often than mine (I tend to take the opposite position of any assertively stated position, for reasons described below). I think your position is the obvious one, and is highly defensible. I thought I had indicated that in my own posts in our exchange, but in case I didn’t, there it is.

                      Here’s my underlying position, a sort of Hegelian/Taoist dialectic: Every thesis has an antithesis, leading to a subtler synthesis that becomes a new thesis generating a new antithesis. The annoyingly simplistic thesis that all things that morally offend the speaker are comparable to the Holocaust (to which you are reacting) generates the antithesis that all comparisons of lesser evils to the Holocaust are inappropriate (which is, more or less, your position). The synthesis is that many comparisons of lesser evils to the Holocaust are inapporpriate, but that there is no a priori certainty that all such comparisons are by necessity inappropriate. That’s my position.

                      There is undoubtedly a reasonable antithesis to my position, but it is not the same as the antithesis to the original thesis. Maybe it’s something like: No comparison of a lesser evil to the Holocaust is appropriate unless it is framed in such a way as to clearly rebut the assumption that it is inappropriate, and until that presumption is rebutted, the logical default position is that it is inappropriate.

                      Some people find all of this logical formalism really, really annoying, and pompous, and throw virtual rotten tomatos at me for engaging in it. I can understand that. If I didn’t know myself better, and were reading this from some remote location, I might come to the same conclusion.

                      But I think it’s useful in public discourse. I think running every issue, every debate, every topic through the crucible of intensely applied logic is a good thing, even if the issue is of the most marginal importance (like this one, regarding whether something a public figure said was “inappropriate” or not). As I said in another post, it helps improve the ratio of signal to noise in our beliefs and understandings.

                      That’s just how I roll.

                      No harm, no foul. I’ll buy you a beer if you make it to the next Pols get-together, right after LB and RSB buy me the one’s they owe me….

                    2. But I thought you were going to start talking about the myriad creatures for a second there, Lao Tzu.

    3. are always started or finished with a comparison to nazis.

      I just don’t understand why on Earth would the majority want to put themselves on record like this.  Killing every bill for the last 4 sessions that would give in-state tuition to children of servicemen and women who are relocated to Colorado by the needs of the service while supporting extending those benefits to undocumented immigrants.

      It just doesn’t make a helluva lot of sense…unless the hope is that the voters will forget this as some sort of inside baseball political snowball fight next year.

    4. Holocaust?  When did we start sending non-citizen kids to the gas chamber?

      These sorts of analogies really piss me off because they make light of shit that was MUCH more serious.

  6. You can actually leave out the merits of the actual bill – they’ve been completely overshadowed by the circus around it.

    If the bill were on the ballot, it would get shellacked n Colorado.  Right or wrong, that’s just the way it is – so it’s a risky proposition…

    Especially when you pull bullshit to get it out of committee, drawing tons of negative press to the Dems.  Everyone outside of the actual Dem caucus thinks this was a mistake, and look at this blog.  Far left, politically active Dems, and YOU guys are divided on the bill.

    Then, I’m sorry, but Foster’s behavior takes the fucking cake.

    This is a big fat egg on the Dem lawmakers faces.  No way around it – and over what?  A dopey bill that would maybe affect 200 illegal aliens per year.

    And then they were too chicken to ram it through and send it to Ritter after the bullshit had been pulled, and they held debate for one of their own who was out of town!!!!

    It honestly doesn’t get much better than this if you’re looking to unseat some of these guys.

    1. The most vulnerable D, Newell, voted against. Morse and Schwartz are the only “yes” votes that come from tough districts, and they don’t seem particularly endangered heading into their next elections.

    2. will now conclude that D’s were idiots for not getting this passed? Or are you saying it was so trivial it really didn’t matter if it passed?

      Or are you saying that partisan R’s are going to now start opposing D”s?

      It didn’t pass. That’s what you think should have happened, right?

      Then it should be the case that you and other voters who agree with you will notice that your desired outcome occurred.

      And you can thank your lucky stars or the political winds of luck that the R’s who voted for this five years ago, voted no this time.

      ttp://www.denverpost.com/newsheadlines/ci_12079730

      1. so that Republicans will win more victories later due to their overreach. Hence few political developments make him angrier than Democrats not passing bills they shouldn’t.

        At least I think that’s it. 🙂

        1. So – would LB support the opponents of the R’s who voted for this five years ago before voting against it now?

          I mean it’s two strikes- one they are an evil flip-flopper. Two , they killed it this time thus depriving R’s of a slam dunk issue next time around.

  7. I predicted that republican control of the radio airwaves would defeat this bill. It has.

    Furthermore, the dems are being vilified as dishonest and cheats. They are not. They are merely stupid and insensitive. And, will regret, I predict again, thinking that as dems, they  are too sophisticated to have to concern themselves with something as redneck as red radio.  

    Caplis is going to run for Senator..IMHO and this is one horse he will ride.

        1. that it was related to higher ed cuts:

          in a climate where the state is cutting or eliminating over $1 billion of benefits to the people and is facing a $300 million cut to higher education, which virtually ends higher education as we know it in the state of Colorado

          as well as

          SB 170 identifies a real problem but does not provide the solution.  I believe the bill is currently at odds with federal law and brings a real risk of the state being sued – and losing.

          The first bit of the second quote really speaks to me.  Frankly I think most of people without documentation can’t afford even $2000 a year (conservative community college).  Which leaves a bill with odd openings for fraud and no help for the people that really need it.  Amendments may have been able to see, IMO, but even as it was amended, the DREAM act would need to pass for 170 to take effect.

          http://senmorgancarroll.com/bl…

          2. …her bit about higher ed cuts seems to be a red herring, but I can understand her voting know if she thinks the bill conflicted with federal law.  If she is right about that.

              1. is also not completely true.  These legislators have constituents and this was a hard sell even to many of their grassroots Dems, much less the indies and moderates the Dems who aren’t in safe Dem districts need to get elected.

                Not only that but when a legislator is deluged with calls and e-mails from constituents, overwhelmingly coming down on one side, should the legislator take those into consideration or act as a completely free agent with no obligation to pay attention to what constituents want? Aren’t they supposed to represent their constituents?

                1. I don’t have a problem with the concept, but…

                  The Feds simply HAVE to fix immigration before we do this.

                  We also need to have access to in-State tuition for vets in any State before we pass legislation to give it to Mexican or other nationals.

                  Nuance.

                  1. Am willing to agree with you on all points. As a matter of principle I think you’re right. As a practical matter I can’t help noting that this would apply to only a few hundred students and that the much larger problem is minority and economically underprivileged students dropping out of High School, not wanting to go to college.

                    1. All of this fiasco over a bill that wasn’t going to change much of anything for much of anyone, or cost much of anything to anyone else.

                      It was just gone about incorrectly at first, then in an asinine way, then in a more asinine way, and then fell on its own sword much to the relief of one Bill Ritter.

                      It makes me feel good to know the Dems have the ability to fuck up like this because they have kicked my party’s ass so badly and seemingly seamlessly the last couple of years.

                2. ….but I do have a problem with trumped up reasons.  Carroll didn’t say, “I voted no because my constituents wanted to vote no, and I want to keep them happy.”  Instead, she gave some vague, seemingly bullshit story about budget cuts to higher ed.  That’s not so honorable to me.

                  1. she was listening to her constituents and she was getting an earful of “no”.  Her SD is in Tancredo land and she was elected, if I recall correctly, by no more than a couple hundred votes, the first Dem in decades, so I have no problem with Newell’s decision.

      2. What I meant  was that red radio targeted this bill six weeks ago, and the dems basically ignored that attack because they think that red radio is not powerful.  I think that the bill could have passed if the dems had a better strategy…one which listened to the concerns of people.

        yesterday, Chris Romer sounded sincere and humbled…he insisted on taking calls on the Silverman/Caplis show….although they only gave him three…..if he had done that, over and over….not argued with the hosts or ignored the power of red radio…but talked to those citizens opposed instead of preaching to the choir….the outcome might have been different.

        1. I’m not sure Romer or other D’s dismiss the power of the talk radio circuit in Denver metro, which certainly leans right.

          Perhaps if Caplis and Silverman were not so eager to cross examine and embarrass those with whom they disagree they would get more participation.  Perhaps Romer and others need to just suck it up and get tough.

          But media strategy aside, I completely agreee this wasn’t explained well.  Proponents had a story -they didn’t get it our there.

          I read the thing, I read what proponents published.  I still couldn’t explain it without it sounding like a real incentive for illegals to come here and a potential penalty for CO students.  

          I don’t think it would have been either.  If it would have been a draw to illegal, then we should see large numbers of illegals in CO now moving to TX, CA, KS and other states that already have instate tuition for them.

          And I still can’t explain why it wouldn’t have been a potential penalty for CO students. For example- I’m not sure how anyone could promise that admissions for CO students could be lost. (Hence my mixed feelings about it passing.)

          In the final analysis, I think the proponent’s had to say- look, illegals aren’t leaving, won’t be deported, are working and should be treated fairly.  If we recognize the reality – we’ll conclude higher ed for them is a plus just like it is for everyone else.

          Perhaps they knew that was the message- and came up with the rest of the story because practical, real world solutions are sometimes too tough to sell.

          1. is comprehensive immigration reform so that the legal murkiness of it is cleared up. If immigrants are on a track to become citizens, then this kind of law makes sense.

            If they’re still legally prohibited from working after they graduate, then their degree doesn’t mean much.

            That being said, if they can pass this in Texas and Kansas, we should’ve been able to pass it here.

            1. about the need to clear up murkiness and arrive at consistent enforcement of rational law.

              Nothing makes life more precarious than selectively enforced laws that can always be used to intimidate and manipulate.  A life dependent on the extent to which laws can be winked at or enforced is an insecure one.  That’s why we were founded as a nation ruled by law not men (or women).  

              We have this murkiness because there are so many people who want to be able to get up on a soap box about illegals while they save money on basement remodels, landscaping, roofing, painting, etc. by employing them.

          2. HELLO madco!  The republicans command the public airwaves in Denver, with the sole exception of little 760…..

            Romer simply did not realize that power early on…Only point I wanted to make.

            As for Caplis/Silverman, they control the number of caller who get on the air.  The callers are part of their strategy, they are targets to be used by the hosts.  I don’t think c/s want any more participation.

            Talk radio is not an open forum for the exchange of ideas. Talk radio is a carefully controlled propaganda machine.

            1. Even if we disagree on the value of engaging Rosen. Caldera, Andrews, Gunny, c/s and the rest, I think we can agree that Romer lacked a media strategy. And that next time he should have one and execute it.

              I think Romer would have done better to focus on the R’s who voted for it the last time* and the D’s who voted no, though that might have created actual work (see the odd treatment of SB166).

              http://www.denverpost.com/sear…

              1. Romer lacked a media strategy.  I personally support a Fairness Doctrine so that both sides would have equal air time on the public airwaves.  I think that engaging right wing red radio hosts is a losing proposition; but, trying to talk over them to their audiences might have worked.

                I think that a compromise could have been effected. For example, the 4-year colleges and universities have enrollment caps.  Maybe it would have been easier to offer in-state tutition at community colleges.  Courses at community colleges have to be able to transfer credits to state 4 year colleges and universities.  It might have been a starting point.

  9. And, how do they register w/o a SS number?  Presuming that they or their parents can’t afford college w/o aid, how would they qualify for loans?

    Like their parents did?

    Although I have no problem with these CO residents paying residential tuition, I just wonder if this isn’t a non-issue.

  10. 1) People always have migrated from desperate poverty toward economic opportunity, and always will. Remember the Israelites “enslaved” in Egypt? They had, in fact, migrated to Egypt due to years of drought in their desert homeland, and were enslaved only by the harshness of the conditions beyond Egypt’s borders. I wonder how many Egyptians at the time expressed resentment of their presence, while depending on their labor? The notion that hungry people migrating toward opportunity that happens to lie across a political border (drawn by conquest and military aggression) is somehow a morally reprehensible act, is itself morally reprehensible. Who among us would look into the eyes of our own undernourished chidren and prefer respecting that militarily imposed line in the sand to putting food in their bellies?

    2) The floodgates of Mexican immigration did not spring open solely under the pressure of their need, but also under the impetus of our own. We have a long history of formally and informally institutionalizing the in-flow of disposable workers from across the border, trying to reverse the current only when it suits our imagined needs.

    3) The costs to the United States of physically preventing that migratory wave, which we ourselves have in large part catalyzed, would be astronomical, and would far exceed the costs of failing to do so, even if such costs existed in reality rather than merely in our recurrent nativist mythology.

    4) Most economic analyses conclude that illegal immigration provides a net economic benefit to the United States economy, including paying a higher ratio of taxes to services received than legal residents and U.S. citizens. While illegal or permissive immigration does create increased competition for jobs at the bottom of the economic scale, depress wages for those jobs, and place strains on local and state public resources, there are more finely honed and productive ways to address these problems than the blunt instruments of severe restrictions on immigration and reduction of immigrants to the status of second class citizens.

    5) Permissive immigration policies (legalizing what is currently illegal) would resolve our most pressing demographic problem: The replacement of a huge oncoming wave of retirees with a sufficient population of tax-paying workers to fund the former’s social security entitlement and medicare payments.

    6) There is absolutely no evidence to indicate that illegal immigrants are any more likely to be reckless drivers than legal residents and U.S. citizens. There is, on the other hand, abundant statistical evidence that illegal immigrants are less likely than legal residents and U.S.citizens to engage in criminal behavior.

    7) Denying educational and occupational opportunities to undocumented immigrants residing in Colorado only serves to breed a permanently impoverished and disenfranchized underclass, imposing future costs far in excess of the (again, imaginary) costs of granting them those educational and occupational opportunities, and forming a breeding ground for resentment and despair. History teaches how truly costly such disparities are in the long run.

    8) It is so well established as to be axiomatic in modern economic theory that global wealth is increased by removing barriers to the free movement of the factors of production, including labor.

    A permissive immigration policy increases both national and global wealth. It increases opportunities for the most deprived. It reduces disparities of wealth. It gives the rest of the world a reason to respect and admire us, and gives us greater reason to respect and admire ourselves.

    America considers itself an enlightened world leader. It’s high time we started acting like one. Rather than clinging to the self-destructive and petty reflexes of ancient tribalism, America can become what it claims to be, and help lead humanity into a wealthier, more just, and more mutually cooperative future.

        1. You know, just because I’m up here, hunched over, ringing these bells all day, and talking to gargoyles (too much Disney, and not enough Victor Hugo?), doesn’t mean I don’t have feelings! I appreciate it.

      2. and only getting “it’s a far, far better rest I go to than I have ever known before.” I mean, you might end up assuming that the book was about mattress shopping, or something!

        No, LB, skipping over all of the paragraphs about Sidney Carton being a ne’er-do-well who happened to look like a really lovable aristocrat whose father was, you know, kinda like you, not only deprives you of the artist’s aesthetically rendered and deeply eddifying insights, but also pretty much condemns you to the depths of Tartarus, pushing rocks up hills, reaching for apples forever bobbing just out of reach…. Much better to accept my invitation to the Elysian Gardens, the Champs Elysee, and read every word, twice, with the relish and joy that it deserves.

        It was the age of LB, it was the age of SH…. 😉

  11. I wish they had not played games to get this out of committee.

    I wish it was fairly voted out of committee and then passed by the leg. It’s never the wrong time to do the right thing.

    The amount is piddly. But symbolicly it’s gigantic, offering a bright future to children who are here.

    2. I hope there are lessons learned (by people who should have learned those lessons long ago).  Sadly, this bill seemed to bring out the worst in people – supporters and opponents.  Shouldn’t have happened.

    3. he should have just let this die in committee (it would have avoided a lot of bad press). He really should have done better at looking ahead to figure out that this was going to fail on second reading. It seems like common sense to me.

  12. Morgan Carroll was disingenuous with her comments about higher ed.  The fiscal note on the bill shows a financial gain to higher ed. Sen Carroll who fancies herself a populist promised many folks in her district that she was a yes, up until recently – ostensibly to get them to leave her alone and not make calls and letters to her.  So much for openness and representative government.

    Five Dems voted against the bill – Carroll, Newell, Isgar, Tochtrop, Keller.  Hard to understand Tochtrop since she has a district nearly 50% Latino – expect a primary for her, and she deserves it. She is the most lacking in integrity in the entire Senate. Not sure about why Isgar voted against it,since he is term limited.

    Lastly, the move to run this on Wednesday with Harvey gone has happened so many times before, under both the Ds and Rs that it is amazing that it has gotten so much mileage.  A real spin control problem rather than a substantive one. Dems need to figure out messaging better. Such voting tactics are the way it works and I don’t think the majority should apologize for taking advantage of an opportunity.  You can be absolutely sure the minority would have done so.  Look back at the eras of Doug Dean and John Andrews…any doubt?  

    1. Her constituents sent literally thousands of emails, postcards, and phonecalls in support.  This morning, students delivered over 4000 constituent signatures in support of SB170.  And Carroll ignored them.  

    2. I don’t think her comments about higher ed were disingenous, just political.  Sure, it would have played well right now, but come election time it would be too easy to spin it just as she laid it out.  Her statement, while not logically correct, was politically strategic.  SB170 would have helped illegal immigrant students at the same time that the state government may be forced to place a huge burden on all students.  It might have played well in the polls now, but down the road could have been disasterous.

      In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Dems were behind this failure.  The Dems that supported it can now use it as a talking point, but since it didn’t pass no one can accuse them of helping illegals while hurting American citizens.

    3. She said it is the wrong time to do this while we are simultaneously preparing to cut $300 million from higher ed and she thought it was in conflict with federal law and would lead to lawsuits CO could lose.

      I read the fiscal note- no matter how you cut it, the fiscal impact is so small it’s essentially zero.

      Your analysis of D no votes is entirely premised on the individuals’ perceive political near term future.  I’d suggest one need look no further than “I thought it was a bad bill” when there is no political gain for the vote.

  13. Senator Morgan Carroll the purest of the pure can read a poll too.  How sad the darling of Be The Change is just the same as every other political whore.

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