EDITORIAL

Washington is gearing up for the year 2010. That's when the national census is taken.

In case anyone is wondering why not much has been done in the past 10 years to stem the flow of immigrants- legal or illegal- into the country, they need look no further than the year 2010.

Census numbers are used to decide the number of Congressional seats in each state and also the number of votes each state has in the Electoral College.

The counting has nothing to do with whether or not the person is a citizen. Their body just has to be there when the counting is done.

For instance, states with the highest number of illegal immigrants substantially raise the numbers of that area and while illegals cannot vote, they wield a lot of power by shifting congressional seats to states with a heavy illegal population.

In 2003, the Center for Immigration Studies found that California gained six more seats in Congress- followed by gains of one each for Texas, Florida and New York.

In contrast, states with fewer non-citizens, both legal and illegal, like Indiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Utah and Wisconsin were "losers."

It boils down to this: states with high rates of citizens are losing representatives to states with high rates of illegal residents.

There is also another wrinkle that impacts presidential elections. The number of votes each state gets in the winner take-all Electoral College tally is the sum of that state's House districts, plus two Senate seats.

California gets six more Electoral College votes, thanks to its non-citizens who are being counted as voters, even though they are not. Meanwhile, nine other states are being cheated out of one vote each.

George W. Bush won the last election by the slim margin of 271 electoral votes to Al Gore's 267. The potential of non-citizens and illegal immigrants deciding presidential elections is just crazy. Is this any way to run a country?

The minute anyone tries to raise this issue, they are immediately labeled "anti-immigration," when, in truth, they are- justifiably- "anti-illegal immigration." There's a huge difference between the two.

Obviously, nothing has been done to correct this problem since the last census in 2000. But, wait a minute, that's not true- something was done. More illegal aliens entered the country and any kind of immigration reform was tossed into the hopper for ideas that never amount to anything.

In other words, the legislators in Washington did what they do best- nothing.

Why would those who now have the power (no matter how they got it) give it up? As the saying goes, "power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."