Immigration Bill: Online and Awaiting Your Comments

Late Friday night, an electronic version of the “immigration reform” bill was finally published, and quickly found its way into the hands of KLo at class=”textlink”>the Corner. From there, it has spread all over the net, of course.
But the published version is a big, clunky PDF file (which, if you like, you can download here.) Good if you plan on printing out all 326 pages of it, not so good if you are a blogger who wants to comment on a particular section and show your readers exactly what you’re talking about.
So I’ve taken the copy published by NRO and parsed it into a format that allows for easy browsing online. Features of this version include:

• A table of contents on the left side that allows you to jump directly to a section of your choice. I’ve also included a “Highlights” index at the top — which should really be “lowlights” — where I’ll collect links to the most interesting sections and commentary on the bill.
• The ability to add comments to any page of the bill, including links back to a blog post or other web commentary. Just go to the section you’re discussing, and click on the ‘add a comment’ link in the right sidebar. You can also, of course, read the comments that everyone else has provided.
• Direct linking to any page of the bill. You can grab the ‘permalink’ for the page you are currently viewing by right-clicking on the “Page x” heading above the bill text. The format for a direct url is simple, though: http://truthlaidbear.com/immigrationbill0518.php?page=x where x is the page number you want to link to.

If those who forged this “compromise” have their way, this bill will be voted on as early as Tuesday. That’s a crazily short amount of time for Senators — let alone the American public — to review, understand, and have a voice on the substance of such a complex bill.
My hope, however, is that by presenting the bill in this form, I will help make the bill more accessible to all, and provide a central spot where commentary, criticism, and suggested improvements can be assembled. Who knows — maybe our erstwhile leaders on Capitol Hill will take notice, and take some of our comments to heart.
There’s only one way to find out, so let’s get to it…