Capitol Hill's top watchdog on illegal immigration, Rep. Tom Tancredo, is not a happy camper these days.

"I guess al-Qaida wants to fill a few jobs no American will take," said the Colorado Republican, reacting to word that an al-Qaida suspect crossed the Mexican border into the United States as thousands of other illegal aliens do every month.

Farida Goolam Mohamed Ahmed, a woman reported to have close ties to al-Qaida, was arrested in McAllen, Texas. She'd flown from London to Mexico City, then entered the United States by crossing the Rio Grande. Reports said she was on a "watch list" and possibly entered the United States as many as 250 times in the past.

"Is it going to take another September 11 to get our leaders in Washington to wake up and start minding the store?" wondered Tancredo, chairman of the House Immigration Reform Caucus.

If illegal immigrants aren't enough to worry about, the congressman has now sent a letter to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell. In it he asks what safeguards exist to ensure that none of the 11,000 Muslims legally eligible for refugee status will turn out to be the next Yassin Aref, one of the two men recently detained after reportedly attempting to obtain shoulder-fired missiles as part of a terrorist plot.

"To hear reports about anyone being granted unconditional citizenship . . . is troubling to say the least," writes. Tancredo. "How can we sleep at night not knowing that our government isn't doing everything possible to prevent another terrorist attack on our own soil?"

BICYCLE ONE

Yes, that mountain bicycle tied to the bike rack of a Suburban on the busy Beltway Sunday afternoon belonged to President Bush, who was a few cars up ahead.

After returning from his tour of hurricane-battered Florida, Bush and his 11-vehicle motorcade, with little traffic control, sped around the outer loop of the Beltway to the Secret Service training center in Beltsville for yet another presidential bike ride.

DEMOCRATIC OBSERVERS

Rep. Lamar Smith, Texas Republican, smells "politics" as the Organization for Security and Cooperation (OSCE) in Europe apparently prepares to arrive in the United States to monitor the 2004 presidential election.

In fact, 10 congressmen sent a letter yesterday to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell demanding answers "within one week," including who had requested the OSCE's presence.

In a recent letter to Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, Texas Democrat, Assistant Secretary for Legislative Affairs Paul V. Kelly indicated that the OSCE would be observing the federal elections this fall.

"Did the Department of State plan to invite the OSCE to observe our elections prior to having received the letter from Congresswoman Johnson dated July 8, 2004?" lawmakers asked.

Furthermore, if the OSCE "did not monitor our presidential elections in 1992, 1996 and 2000, are election observers being sent to the United States in response to the contested presidential election in 2000?"

And in what cities and states will the observation mission be deployed, and who will determine where the observers will be posted?

Finally, does the OSCE "have any authority to . . . issue a report or make determinations as to whether elections in the United States are 'full' and 'fair?'"

As the curious congressmen see it, many OSCE members are emerging democracies that are younger than 15 years old, and would it not "be more appropriate for the OSCE to direct its resources to these newly sovereign states?"

EMBASSY OF SORTS

It was a little more than a year ago, in May 2003, that the State Department reached out to young Iranians through the "Persian Web site."

Because the United States has no official presence in Iran, the Iranian-language site was intended to serve as a virtual embassy and cultural center for hundreds of thousands of Iranians with access to the Internet.

Now, the department says it has received hundreds of e-mails thanking the U.S. government for its support, especially during weeks of student demonstrations calling for democracy in a country that President Bush has lumped in the "axis of evil."

THEN AND NOW

A most intriguing school test appears in the current issue of Education Reporter, describing what eighth-graders in the United States were expected to know in 1910 (suffice it to say, many students today wouldn't know where to begin).

Among 10 grammar questions: "In what must a pronoun agree with its antecedent? Illustrate."

Under orthography, spell: "laudanum, beneficent, declension."

A few from the U.S. and civic history category: "State the qualifications of a U.S. senator . . . What has made the names of each of the following historical: Alexander Hamilton, U.S. Grant, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Cyrus W. Field, Clara Barton? . . . Give an account of the framing and adoption of the Declaration of Independence."

After students got through rather tough questions in geography, arithmetic and physiology, there was this easy (for students of yesteryear, at least) question: "Quote two stanzas of 'America.'"

WITH A TWIST

Here at The Beltway Beat, we often receive intriguing political press kits, but never before has a stainless steel martini shaker appeared on our desk.

Compliments of House Rules Committee Chairman Rep. David Dreier, California Republican, who for one night during the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York (Mr. Dreier is convention parliamentarian) will be serving up "Dreier Big Apple Martinis" to his invited guests.

BRANDED BROTHER

Should we boo or should we applaud
One so fine or fatally flawed?
Is John Kerry a hero
Or despicable zero,
Man of honor or posturing fraud?

- F.R. Duplantier

U.S.A.

"To clear up any possible misconception from Pool Report No. 1, Scott McClellan says that President Bush would of course support the American soccer team in any hypothetical game with Iraq."

- White House Pool Report No. 2, clearing up any confusion gathered from a previous White House pool report quoting White House spokesman Scott McClellan about where Mr. Bush's loyalty would lie if the U.S. Olympic soccer team were to face a surprisingly competitive Iraqi soccer team.

FATHER OF . . . SORTS

First lady Laura Bush said she won't forget one visit she and President Bush made to an elementary school not long ago, where "a little second-grader came out to welcome us and bellowed, 'George Washington!'

"Close, just the wrong George W.," Mrs. Bush said.

DAKOTA DUNG

Can't we just all get along?

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle's campaign has called on Republican Senate challenger South Dakota Rep. John Thune to apologize on behalf of his campaign manager, who reportedly verbally berated a Daschle staffer and referred to Daschle with a barnyard obscenity.

During a candidate forum held in front of school administrators and board members in Sioux Falls, Thune's campaign manager, Dick Wadhams, is said to have approached Jeremy Funk and told him that his boss - Daschle - was a "chicken (expletive deleted)" for not showing up.

"Berating young staffers and referring to public officials with obscenities is not how we do things in South Dakota," says Daschle's campaign manager, Steve Hildebrand. Continued...