THE BORDER REPORT

The most surprising event from the election results last night wasn't the Democrat sweep into the House but a Republican crossing the line into Dem territory to deliver a congralutaroy kiss on the cheek. Across town, anti-immigrant restrictionists and the people who love to hate them were playing games with each other, with one side trying to get the Feds involved. According to an FBI spokeswoman, the bureau received calls after voters were harassed by a trio of men shouting their support for an opposition candidate. One of the men was wearing a holstered gun on his belt. But the trio of loudmouths were standing outside the 75-foot boundary required at polling places, the spokeswoman said. MALDEF, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, was quick to report to the folks at Muckraker.com that voters were being videotaped and intimidated by haters. At this point, I don't know who the greater attention seekers were. These things are worth mentioning, mainly because they show how petty the extremists on either side of an issue can get. Jim Kolbe stepped up, delivering one last slap to the card-carrying Minuteman Randy Graf, in personally congratulating Gabrielle Giffords before the television cameras. If my sources are correct, Graf fought a somewhat dirty campaign, not against Giffords but rather Kolbe. The rumor is Graf was responsible for leaking to the press that Kolbe was set to direct the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. In the end, it did't much matter because the Fund passed over Kolbe, but the two men have seemed to at least dislike if not outright hate one another on sight. We’ll see now how sincerely Giffords plans to take up Kolbe's push for a guestworker program. In past interviews, she's gone a step further than Kolbe did in trying to solve the knot in all the guestworker plans - what to do with the 12-20 million illegal immigrants already in the country. Giffords says she wants those people to pay a fine and back taxes. Under the McCain-Kennedy bill sponsored by Kolbe, those people would have to pay a fine and undergo a criminal and medical background check. But the 800-pound gorilla in the room has stayed quiet. Senator John McCain backed Graf in District 8. He still hasn't come out to say anything, even though, presumably, Giffords is going to pick up where her predecessor left off in supporting McCain's guest worker program. This is the man who famously said last month, "I think I'd just commit suicide," if the Democrats took over the Senate. Well, early calls by The Washington Post and The Associated Press have the Democrats taking the Senate. We'll have to see what McCain says now.