It's finally occured to the geniuses in the Alabama Legislature that HB-56 is a disaster for the state. Ya think, guys? Seems like some of them woke up on the sane side of the bed for a change.
A week after a spokesman for Senate President Pro Tem Del Marsh asserted that "...there are no unintended consequences that have been brought to the table," and a day after Senate Rules Committee chair (and HB-56 co-sponsor) Scott Beason lost his chairmanship, some GOP legislators are openly calling for change.
Even more bizarre, they're expressing shock and dismay that the bill is making life more difficult for everyone in the state and is incurring the ire of the business interests that fund most GOP campaigns. Well guys... here's a short clip for you:
A few delicious quotes:
Dial said he doesn't believe the immigration law, approved in the waning days of the legislative session in June, would have passed if senators had had more time to fully understand its ramifications.
[...]
"Everybody seems to understand that there have been some unintended difficulties that need to be addressed," Dixon said. "Nobody intended to create problems for American citizens."
[...]
Dial said the bill's requiring proof of legal residence or citizenship for every transaction with a state or local government, including all license renewals, is too cumbersome.
[...]
Waggoner has said he has heard from a myriad of businesses that are having difficulty finding skilled workers. The aim of the bill -- to put Alabamians to work in positions that had been occupied by undocumented workers -- was laudable, but not practical in all instances.
[...]
"People that are in the masonry business, you can't just hire an unemployed person and tell him to go lay bricks," Waggoner said.
Now, I'm willing to cut Gerald Dial a little slack here because he's shown through past statements that he really isn't able to guess the effects of legislation. Just consider his famous
statement about Constitution reform:
“If we had had home rule, Lowndes County would not have any white land-owners.”
But the rest of the Legislature doesn't get off so lightly. They can't credibly claim that "nobody knew" what was going to happen when they passed this shoddy piece of legislation. If Beason & Hammon had taken their heads out of the turkey blind long enough to look at the experience in other states, they would have known HB-56 wasn't only a bad idea: it was a bad law so poorly written that everyone in the state is caught in its snare.
Time to throw all these bums out. They passed legislation that's cost the state billions in actual business losses and tarnished our image even more.
We have plenty of time to organize while we're killing time in the Beason Lines.
Cross-posted at LeftInAlabama.com