Trading votes for pork

Yesterday, when the 23 Kennedy Republicansâ„¢ voted to shove the Immigration Bill down the throat of unhappy voters, I wrote:

I’d like to know what incentives or promises were dangled in their greedy-little faces to make them ignore the overwhelming will of the voters.

And, I specifically called out the two Senators the furthest removed from the illegal immigration problem:

Of course Sen. Stevens and Murkowski voted for Shamnesty — being the furthest land-connected US state from Mexico, Alaska only has a 5.1% Hispanic population, with little to no chance of that increasing due to illegal immigration.

Well, Robert Bluey answers my suspicions about incentives and promises in exchange for their votes:

Although it’s separated from the continental United States, Alaska’s pork-loving Republican senators, Ted Stevens [and] Lisa Murkowski, still managed to bring home the bacon. According to Reid’s amendment, they’ll get a Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Fairbanks, a city that’s located in the middle of the state.

Because what could be more convenient for a bunch of immigration services-seeking Mexicans who crossed the border in Matamoros, Mexico — 3440 miles from the Citizenship and Immigration Services office in Fairbanks?

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Stevens and Murkowski weren’t the only GOP Senators promised goodies from Reid, either:

Let’s begin in Utah, where Republican Sen. Bob Bennett would get a satellite U.S. attorney office in St. George, Utah. “The primary function of the satellite office shall be to prosecute and deter criminal activities associated with illegal immigrants,” reads the amendment. By the way, it’s not the only government office in St. George. Bennett has a district office there, too.

Is there a single honest person left in Washington D.C.?

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Ace wonders, “Are we, ehh, concerned about illegal caribou, I wonder?”