Glenn Reynolds has earned a hearty "Thank you" from the public in this post , in which he links to a remarkable achievement by N.Z. Bear.  The latter has broken out the monstrous draft immigration bill--over 300 pages--in a form that makes it readily available to any citizen who has access to the internet.  He provides a table of contents, listing topics by subsections, complete with links to every subsection and to individual pages.  The beauty of it is that the right-hand sidebar has space for comments.  The visitor can read existing comments and append commentary ad lib. 

At the present writing, one sees only a handful of comments, led off by a link to a scathing example from Mickey Kaus.  That must change, and swiftly.  Let your imagination run wild for a moment.  The Senate Majority Leader wants to ram the bill through in the absence of any serious debate.  It is unlikely that other senators will let him get away with that.  If not, the public has an unparalleled opportunity--and a unique challenge--to be heard.  Picture it: a few days into the debate, the blogosphere dumps on every senator's desk a copy of N.Z. Bear's version, marked up by us The Great Unwashed, acting as a committee of the whole, and bearing hundreds or possibly thousands of heartfelt critiques.  The Bear's achievement in making this possible is unprecedented, even world-changing.

We must buckle down to it, citizens.  It's a patriotic duty. First, go here, to benefit from N.Z. Bear's guidance on how to get the most from his effort.  Then, go there to read the bill and mark it up. Absent that effort on our part, we'll have only ourselves to blame when the D.C. sausage factory serves up a rotten, stinking mess.

Contributed by 72nd TCS on May 21, 2007 at 02:57 AM in Current Affairs, G W Bush, John "72nd TCS" Werntz, John McCain, Remember the Alamo, Unclear on the concept | Permalink

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