Shadowscope

I sent emails to my Representatives last week about the REAL I.D. Act (in opposition) and just received this one back from Phil Gingrey’s office.

June 28, 2007

Mr. Richard Miles

SomeStreet

Somewhere, GA 30179

Thank you for contacting me regarding H.R. 418 the Real I.D. Act as introduced by Chairman Sensenbrenner of the House Judiciary Committee in the 109th Congress.

Considering our nation’s recent focus on Homeland Security and the War on Terror, I believe it is more important than ever to examine and reform existing immigration laws. We must control immigration and prevent terrorism without tarnishing our history as a nation of immigrants.

I agree, it is important to update immigration laws to represent the ever-changing social landscape and needs of our country. During our current national crisis, we must be especially careful to balance security with legal immigration. I believe our limited economic resources dictate a need to manage and thoroughly examine our immigration levels to ensure that we are not overstretching our national and local resources.

With a porous border, our current level of security must be bolstered to apprehend illegal aliens and intruders looking to endanger our country and its citizens. I believe the recommendation of the 9/11 Commission to strengthen our border security and the move by Congress to include these recommendations in H.R. 10 were appropriate. However, on December 7, 2004, S.2845, the National Intelligence Reform Act of 2004 cleared the House/Senate Conference Committee without the immigration recommendations and passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 336 to 75.

These immigration provisions included: eliminating the Western Hemisphere exceptions for United States citizens, modifying authority to waive documentation requirements for Canadian, Mexican, and Caribbean nationals, establishing a standard for identification required by aliens, and establishing minimum national standards for State-issued driver’s licenses. In response, Chairman Sensenbrenner introduced H.R. 418 the Real I.D. Act (the left out 9/11 provisions wrapped into a separate new bill), which passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 261-161 on February 10, 2005. I believe this legislation is necessary to regain control over our border and strengthen current immigration policy.

Again, thank you for sharing your concerns. Please feel free to contact me again if I can be of further assistance. Also, you may like to know that you can contact me via email at gingrey.ga@mail.house.govor my website www.house.gov/gingrey.

In other words, “Thank you for contacting us but we feel like more big brother in your life is just what you need in addition to more money in the federal governments coffers, so…

PREPARE TO BE BOARDED BREAK OUT THE FUCKING KY BOY!!!!”

Everything comes with a price I suppose. My back is playing tricks on me this morning and my arms and legs are like jelly but I am ready to get back out on the lake. Man, that was a blast.

Today won’t be quite as much fun. I still have one on vacation and another off and it’s the last day of the fiscal period so I have to spend the day closing numbers and then go put up the delivery truck at the store where she is on vacation. Being so sore that should work out some of the kinks. Somewhere around 150 cases of miscellaneous food and other stuff will come in around noon today.

The wife should get paid today so I think that she and the girls are going to rent a car and drive down to the redneck riviera tomorrow for a couple of days and hang out on the beach. I am jealous, but luckily we will head the other direction at some point next week and go to Hilton Head, Bluffton, and maybe Savannah.

Still have to maybe set something up in Atlanta next week as well. I suck at putting together social crap like that. If it doesn’t involve beer and a grill in my backyard I usually defer to other people to set this stuff up, but maybe I will call a couple of folks and see if they still want to get together. There are a couple of unanswered emails in my inbox about that very thing.

…just in case you need a visual aid

Our multi-unit get-together today was a blast. We ended up going to the lake in the gated community where my boss lives. I’ve a fairly large area, and we were using an island. I got there about 11:30 or so and he came to pick us up at the marina and took us all out to the island. Lots of good food, ribs, hot dogs, plenty of side dishes, and even beer.

I ended up getting on this floating thing and getting pulled behind the boat a couple of times. I was about the only one that didn’t get dumped off. It fit up the three or four people, so at one point there were three of us getting pulled. The two of them fell off at which point I went airborne and came back down with a resounding thump as my breath went out of me. By god I held on for dear life though.

I do have a nice little sunburn now and I am sure that when I wake up tomorrow not only will my sunburn be hurting like a bitch but my back is probably going to be killing me as well.

I did let my boss know that I would be late tomorrow as I will end up taking the wife and girls where they need to go prior to coming in. I have a ton of work to do tomorrow. Luckily my manager comes back from vacation on Saturday. Damn I am ready for that.