I think I can speak for roughly 65% of Democrats and 74% of Republicans when I say, "whew...that was close!" But the fact that the Senate has only delayed discussion of the - as it now has been dubbed "The Grand Bargain" - means we stay on offense to hold the Senate's feet to the fire.

It is obvious from everyone that has read anything on his blog in the last five days that Hugh Hewitt should have been consulted on the original bill. Hugh has posted what he considers his "starting seven." What I love about them is that more  than half of them - and all coming up front - deal with actual border security:

(1) An amendment to establish a special category of illegal aliens which includes all males between the ages of 18 and 30 from countries with significant jihadist networks, with that list of countries to be determined by the DoD, the CIA and State. No probationary Z visas under Section 601(h) would issue to such illegals. A special visa could issue, but one that required special care in the background checks and special restrictions on the movement of such applicants until after their background checks were complete.

(2) Construction of at least half of the double-fencing prior to the issuance of a single probationary visa, and completion of all 800+ miles of the double fencing prior to the issuance of any 4 year Z visa or any Y visa.

(3) Acceleration of the six-year build-up in the authorized level of Border Patrol agents so that its number of agents reaches 25,000 within 3 years with the funding for their hiring in place. This should be another hard trigger.

(4) A detailed statement of how and by whom the millions of background checks and interviews called for by the act are to be done, with funding authorized and allocated to support such obligations. This should also be a trigger.

(5) A set of easy to read ceilings on Y visas which cannot be raised except by Congressional directive.

(6) The elimination of social security credits for years worked as an illegal, and the payment --perhaps over a term of years-- of at least 50% of unpaid back taxes

(7) This may seem odd, but I believe the employer penalties for record-keeping violations should be struck from the bill. The burden-shifting to business of enforcing the immigration laws is going to be large in any event, but to impose on businesses the absurd paperwork completion and storage requirements --backed by a $1,000 per incident fine-- empowers bureaucrats to punish any employer they take a disliking to. Keep Mike Nifong in mind when you consider how abusive such a requirement could be made to be even for employers who cannot be shown to have employed a single illegal alien.

The beauty is - they make sense, they are easy to understand - and they don't take up 1000 pages. SENATORS please take note.