The immigration bill failed for many reasons. Indeed, one of them is trying to solve everyone's needs in one bill. But the main reason the bill failed was hate. Many will deny this, but that's where this country is headed, led by the hateful, spiteful, right wing media. If we truly believed in "legal" immigration and "border security" we would FIRST develop an adequate guest worker progam. Then the border security task would get much easier, cheaper, and could focus serious problems such as the organized drug trade rather than attempting to thwart the economic pressure that drives immigrants north, by building en expensive wall. Legal migration is essentially free, funded entierely through fees. A border wall will cost billions and won't do the job.

"What part of illegal don't you understand" is just code for "I hate all those foreigners."

Senate leaders seeking a rational immigration bill have received hate phone calls, even death threats. Does that show an honest desire for legal immigration?

romney did not hire illegal immigrants to do his landscaping. he hired a person whose company hired them. thats like saying you supported illegal immigration every time you buy a hamburger from mcdonalds.

It is not realistic to build a fence around our country...I don't see anyone posting about a Canadian fence. Probably because the people up north aren't poor nor Mexican–right?

We need to fix the immigration laws to encourage people to come and join our country correctly. Has anyone reviewed the process? Its ridiculous – maybe you should review it before critcizing immigrants – especially poor ones.

We need to get new laws in place very badly–the Senate vote is extremely unfortunate. It could have served as a baseline. We could change/allow states to add on where needed, but we needed something. I think it begins with Bush getting the hell out of "our" White House. America can ill afford his tactics of divide an conquer much longer.

Umm... in this case, he did. I'm not saying he does play to the masses (the only Republican I've been following is Ron Paul), but in this case his opinion reflects what appears to be the majority.

Personally, I don't see how it's fair for 12+ million people to immediately gain citizenship after entering illegally, while people that can't "simply" cross the border have to wait (I know, it's not so simple). I do think that the most pressing issue is to get the wall up AND look for ways to make the process of citizenship faster and more efficient.

On the other hand, I agree with Stefan above: The most practical way to stop businesses from hiring illegal immigrants, and thus reduce the incentive to come here illegally, is to force businesses to pay these workers the same wages a citizen would earn. I'd also love to know how we would ship the millions of families back home, without turning into some frightening police state.

So, Stefan, if we make this batch of 12 million or so legal, then what's to stop the next 12 million coming in? If we make these people legal and subject to minimum wage, don't you think comaines who want to hire illegals cheaply will just shun tham and bringin more illegals from Mexico? And the whole process starts all over again, just like it did when we made this mistake the first time back in the 80's.

And if you think there are really 12 million, think again. Its much more like 20 million and by some stimates as much as 35 million. That's another hole in the bill – how can you create and fund a bill when you don't even know how many people you're dealing with, and what the real costs are??

Our borders MUST be enforced, our laws MUST be enforced and the companies who are bringing illegal immigrants to this country with the promise of jobs must be punished. This is the only solution for our illegal immigration problem that makes any sense.

The politicians must understand that the people of this country are demanding, and will continue to demand, that our quality of life and this country come first.

Romney stood up tall and wasn't afraid to say that the immigration bill wasn't crafted correctly and shouldn't go through. And he said it at a time when it looked like it would make it. The majority of Americans agree with him on this one.

Give me a break. What society needs to stop doing is blaming everybody else for their own problems. You know whose hurting the children? THEIR PARENTS. The parents break the law and then scream about how we are making their children suffer.

I am sick and tired of people giving parents (legal or illegal) a free pass.

come on... the only people interested in building that fence are the contractors due to the million of dollars they are going to receive.

(by the way do they plan to check who is building this fence to make sure no illegal immigrants are employed during the construction ? )

A refresher course in history will show that a fence never blocked anybody to enter a country see maginot line and the german panzer division during WWII or more recently the fence between israel and palestine or the fence in bagdad to divide suburbs ...)

people will just fly over it, dig under it or just go around with a boat through California or Texas...

Furthermore, any person planning to attack again the US definitely would not cross the mexican border on foot with "jose the landscaper" and "maria the maid"
they would simply hire a private jet, charter a boat from the bahamas or buy frequent flyer miles on ebay to get a flight to JFK....

Once again J, if the illegal alien that we are talking about and are having to pay tax on actually did some melting, this may not be such a hot-button issue. It is time for all of us to really sit down and determine what it is to be an American. Simply coming here to work, while making no attempt to be a part of our "Melting Pot Society," should not be sufficent for citizenship. That is what is at issue. I do not want the geography of our great cities to be "Melting Pot" and then "El Barrio."

Please, just take your kids back home with you. They can change their citizenship too, ya know.

I couldn't image doing anything else but that with mine..

A S, I think people are thinking about the children, because they are thinking about the parents that brought them here and will bring them up in America "the beautiful." Look at the statistics, number one drop out rate among all high school students in the US is among students of illegal families. One of the main problem that most people are not talking about is the failure of many of these illegals to assimulate. In previous immigration periods with Germans and the Irish, these groups tried to assimulate into general population to the point that within a generation it was impossible to determine when individuals arrive. In the situation we see now we see illegals here for decades who are unable to speak English, and, while trying to protest that they stay here, wave a Mexican flag in our faces. It is in that kind of environment that these kids are being brought up in, and it is why they are already wasting their opportunities in the public schools and general economy today.