Why is that challengers veer to wedge issues to launch their campaigns ?
Dick Day’s resume is full of a pro-business agenda that should easily make him a qualified candidate for US House, yet his immigration agenda is what the papers are reporting.
Ruthie (Ruth) Hendrycks announced her campaign, to replace Brad Finstad representing Minnesota House District 21B, with a focus on immigration. I suppose this should not be a surprise since in her 2006 campaign for Minnesota Lt. Governor, she was running to “preventing the balkanization of Minnesota.” At that time, she announced “that the lack of political experience is one of our team's biggest assets.” Well, since she did not acknowledge any “political experience” in her announcement, she might need to a little advice.
William J. Stuntz in the February 18 issue of The Weekly Standard has an article entitled The Inconvenient Truths of 2008 :” The Republican base wants the country to reacquire control over its southern border, and wants to see the millions of illegal immigrants already here expelled or punished--because anything less rewards them for their violations. The first goal is both good policy and good politics. The second is a practical impossibility and a political disaster. No American government can afford to track down and expel, fine, or otherwise penalize 12 million of its residents: 17 times the number of convicted felons who enter prison each year (and today's imprisonment rate has shattered historical records). That much law enforcement is beyond government's capacity--a fact for which conservatives, of all people, should be thankful.
Not only will the illegals themselves remain, so will generations of their offspring: a large voting bloc that will be forever barred to the party that wanted to ship their parents and grandparents back to their Central American homes. If the penalties for illegally crossing the border are more than a pittance, immigrants will simply refuse to pay them and remain underground, and no future government will spend the money needed to catch and prosecute them. Given those circumstances, amnesty is less a policy choice than a statement of political reality: the rough equivalent of bankruptcy for a debtor who, without it, will never pay another creditor another dime. To put the point differently, the size of America's Latino population means that the nation's border control problem must be solved with that population's consent.
Stuntz assessment is that no matter how passionately held the belief, reality must be considered.
Wishing doesn't make it so.
Yep, that was from The Weekly Standard ... not exactly part of the liberal media elite.
IF any candidate pushes wedge issues in lieu of the national debt, health care, foreign relations, the environment, job creation and growth, and an energy policy, they are just avoiding addressing the real issues.
For more of my thoughts on immigration, click any of these link
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4 comments:
I don't agree with your assessment that the Weekly Standard is the authority on conservatism with respect to the immigration issue. The Weekly Standard has taken a pretty Washington, D.C. elitist point of view that amnesty and open borders are good. This certainly doesn't square with the majority of Republicans who mobilized to make sure that the McCain Kennedy immigration bill went down in flames.
While we all agree that we need immigrants coming into our country, the point is to do it the right way by securing the border and controlling the number of people who come in to work.
As someone who is pretty middle of the road, don't you think that illegal immigration is driving down wages in this country and driving up social costs (and accordingly taxes) like health care, education, incarceration, etc.
What's inconvenient about immigration is that the Weekly Standard is out of touch with most Republicans.
Also, the idea that we have to deport or incarcerate illegal immigrants to force them to leave our country is a red herring. If we were serious about ending illegal immigration, we could implement an identification and employment verification system, along with fines for employers who knowingly hire/retain illegal immigrants. Once the jobs go away, many of the people who are here illegally will simply return to their home country on their own.
Moreover, it's not compassionate to the illegal immigrants to perpetuate the current system. First, the people are looking over their shoulders and are living in the shadows in fear of being removed from the country. Second, they get no benefit for the payroll taxes that employers are supposed to withhold. Third, many are not paid the minimum wage and are otherwise forced to work in substandard conditions by unscrupulous employers.
Let's secure the border, crack down on unethical employers and monitor who are coming into our country to work.
Exactly. Deportation by attrition.
Ruthie has the right stance on ILLEGAL immigration.
all of the other issues mentioned - are affected by illegal immigration. And that would be negatively affecting them! Attrition through enforcement. We do not need new laws. We need to enforce the ones we have. Jailing employers who hire them, stopping sanctuary cities and the list goes on and on. Plus stopping the misuse of the 14th amendment and these people will go home and work to improve their their own country. FREE RAMOS AND COMPEAN!! That would be a good start by our administration!!
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