Many could learn from Flake vote

From the political notebook: » The most interesting and important vote from the Arizona delegation on the deal to reopen the federal government was that of Sen. Jeff Flake. In fact, Flake’s vote was one of the most instructive in the country.

In his political career, Flake has been an icon of fiscal conservatism. And he has cast many a quixotic vote on behalf of its principles. He cannot credibly be accused of being part of any surrender caucus.

Yet rather than casting a symbolic vote against the deal, he pointedly voted for it. That’s because Flake understands the importance of maintaining sequester spending levels, which this deal did.

The sequester is the automatic restraints that went into effect when the previous supercommittee came up empty. It’s the only spending restraint in town. And it’s been pretty effective. Sequester-level spending is $75 billion below what the Democrats want to spend.

This deal extended sequester-level spending for another 31⁄ months.

Flake’s vote should be an education for the House Republican members of the Arizona delegation — Trent Franks, Paul Gosar, Matt Salmon and David Schweikert — who, like most GOP congressmen, voted no.

If House Republicans continue to ask for things Democrats aren’t going to give, and then vote no when they don’t get them, the sequester restraint is likely to be discarded. In January, if House Speaker John Boehner again has to rely on Democratic votes for the government to be able to pay its bills, it won’t be for funding at sequester levels.

» Protest politics sometimes do work. Certainly the civilrights protests stirred the conscience of the country and precipitated changes in laws and cultural mores.

Immigration-reform advocates are trying to do the same, including ventures into civil disobedience. Arizona Congressman Raúl Grijalva ostentatiously got himself arrested at a protest recently.

Yet, so far, these protests haven’t stirred the conscience. In fact, they seem to trigger a backlash, hardening sentiment against immigration reform. There’s a reason for this. Jim Crow was per se immoral and unjust. There are those who believe immigration laws are also per se immoral and unjust, that national borders are just arbitrary lines on a map and people should have a right to live and work wherever they want.

But this is a rare sentiment. Most people believe in nationstates and the right of nation- states to determine the conditions under which foreigners can immigrate.

Those who are in the country illegally broke our laws to be here. And in virtually all cases, they are also committing identity fraud or theft to remain here.

There are those, and I’m among them, who favor amnesty for most of those who are in the country illegally. But our immigration and identity laws aren’t per se immoral or unjust. Legal status isn’t something to which those who violated them are morally entitled. Amnesty would be an act of national grace and a gift.

People shaking their fists in your face demanding an act of grace and a gift is off-putting.

» Manuel “Lito” Pena, who passed away last week, was one of the most conscientious legislators in Arizona history.

I suppose I should have regarded him as an adversary. In the late 1970s, I represented the Arizona Chamber of Commerce on labor issues and Pena was or- ganized labor’s leading legislative supporter. Yet we worked together on some big deals in those days that increased benefits for workers while tightening up some rules that bothered the business community.

Pena was also the leading legislative advocate of consumer-protection laws. I surprised, and I think amused, him one time by asking him to look at a change in the law some of my members wanted. I said that if he found it reasonable and fair, I’d run the bill. If he didn’t, I wouldn’t.

He did his homework and said he could support the change. Later, some Democrats tried to make political hay out of the business community allegedly weakening consumer-protection laws. But Pena never budged.

For Pena, the policy was more important than the politics. Which was why I could never view him as an adversary, but only as a model of what a legislator should be.