Bush's Achilles Heel - The Border!
In March I posted on Bush's stance, or lack thereof, on the Mexican border....in this piece.I felt then this was a possible mess for Mr. Bush. Now it appears the mess is growing and might break out as a full-fledged situation for 2006.
Mickey Kaus, over at Slate, writes:
"Yes, I am coming for the Bush amnesty program." That's what one illegal immigrant reportedly told a U.S. border patrol questioner in a survey the Bush administration understandably failed to complete. About 45 percent of those questioned "said that 'amnesty rumors' influenced their decision to cross the border illegally," according to WaPo's report. ... True, just because illegal immigrants try to get into the country in time to qualify for a proposed amnesty (or semi-amnesty) doesn't mean they'll still try to get into the country after the amnesty deadline passes and our official policy becomes "no more amnesty." But it does show they are responsive to the formal legal rewards and punishments they think await them in the United States. And I'd have more confidence in immigration reformers if they didn't ignore this obvious reality and say idiotic things like the following:
"People risk their lives to come for work and to feed their families," said Douglas Rivlin of the National Immigration Forum in Washington. "The idea that they come in response to political speeches is silly."
P.S.: It's impossible for me not to hear an echo here of the welfare debate, in which liberals scoffed for decades at the idea that anybody would ever bear children or travel across state lines because of the existence or nonexistence of welfare benefits. The main difference is that in the welfare case it was hard to find recipients who forthrightly told questioners, "Yes, I came to this state for its welfare program!" ... 10:36 P.M.
Back in April, James Atticus Bowden added another dimension to the problem when he wrote on the Bush comments on the Minutemen. That was a major BAD by Mr. Bush, in my humble opinion.
I still maintain, Bush is really weak on this one, and apparently unconcerned about the buzz in the media, as well as in his own party!
I predict this will get a whole lot bigger before it goes anywhere like "away"!
Duke
posted by Duke of DeLand @ 6/30/2005 02:19:00 PM
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