Posted on 05/14/2006 6:20:19 PM PDT by Spiff
President Bush will deliver a televised address to the nation tonight on immigration policy. It is his first address from the Oval Office on immigration, and if it not successful, it may be his last.
In this speech, the President needs to do three things to accomplish his goals. There is a road to consensus and success if the President will take it. It is not only a path to consensus -- it is a path to success for the Republican Party in November.
In his Monday speech, the President needs to make a clear break from previous speeches on the topic and come home to Republican Party principles. He needs to stop pandering to perceived voting blocs and employer lobbies and speak to the one thing all Americans agree upon: No immigration policy is workable without secure borders.
The President needs to speak to the nation as fellow citizens, not ethnic or economic groups, and tell them America will have secure borders that stop all illegal entry into our country. He needs to announce that he will federalize the National Guard in four border states to provide support to the beleaguered Border Patrol. He needs to say this will happen tomorrow morning, not next month or next year.
The second thing the President must do is explicitly separate the priority and necessity of secure borders from all other proposed federal legislation. Secure borders do not depend on a “comprehensive” immigration reform package that includes amnesty and a new temporary worker program. Secure borders are a prerequisite for any new immigration legislation, not a component to be bartered away for increased immigration numbers or new visa rules.
The third thing the President’s speech should do is to avoid any mention of amnesty for illegal aliens already in the country. No matter how cleverly he defines his “legalized status” proposal as not being amnesty, it is still amnesty and everyone knows it.
Americans are not in a mood to negotiate the matter of “regularization” for 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens -- and Newt Gingrich has pointed out the amnesty would ultimately legalize up to 36 million -- until they see we have in fact achieved secure borders. Once that is done, once our laws are being enforced, then we can begin to discuss the problem of how to deal with the millions of illegal aliens already living here.
I hope the President and his advisers are perceptive enough to see that this course of action is the only one that will achieve all of his goals. It will unify the Republican Party. It will stop the flood of illegals aliens crossing our borders. And perhaps most importantly, it will point America in a positive direction for immigration policy and set a foundation for future reform. To be sure, it will not solve all of our immigration-related problems -- but it will be a much-needed and long overdue start.
A new beginning is what we desperately need, and the President’s speech can do that if it is based on candor, on Republican principles and the priority of secure borders. Anything less will not only not be a new beginning, it may very well be the end of Republican coherence and credibility.
Rep. Tancredo (R.-Colo.) is chairman of the Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus.
Tancredo is my mentor.
Well, who is more foolish...the fool or the fool who follows him...??
Cut the bogus arguments...
If there is amnesty and rewards in any plan, it is doomed to fail. Period. Secure the border and then come back later with a "guest worker plan". The House of Representatives had the right idea with the Republican bill. The Kennedy plan that the President is embracing - and which he may slightly modify Monday evening to try to sell it to his angry base - is unacceptable.
Any future proposal - after the borders are secured - of a path to citizenship needs to disqualify border violators who don't deport themselves before a certain deadline and it must require that they return to their home nation and stay there to apply. Anything else rewards criminals. Rewarding criminals is not a conservative or a Republican value.
You lie, again. Conservative Republican Tom Tancredo is not soft on crime - your smears notwithstanding.
You, however, have bragged about your hiring of illegal aliens and became defensive and angry for being questioned about it stating that it was nobody's damned business who you hired on your property.
Hell he hired illegals. According to your fellow traveler that is a felony. But hey take it up with him/her.
Attitudes like what?
If he strips guest worker program in any form? Not merely feints at doing so? Yes. It's called rewarding pols for doing the right thing. This isn't a hard concept to grasp.
Gee let's see. Dorgan votes liberal (or wrong) 81% of the time and he's done that for 19 years.
Doing the right thing 19% of the time for 19 years is not my idea of a pol doing the "right thing" and is not my idea of a pol who should be rewarded.
Simple, really...except for you.
Sink can you believe that post?
How about this, if he gives you your troops on the border and some type of fence/wall along with his guest worker program and path to citizenship will you STFU and help us keep the democrats out of majority control in 2006?
There must be something that us non-Texans don't understand about the brilliance of importing millions of indentured servants (with the political and social baggage attached) into this country. Texas, it's a nice place, drove through it once. But, maybe this is a Texas concept. Rest of us don't like it, at all.
Standing and applauding. You just friggin' NAILED IT!
"I'm depressing myself, not because I dislike Spanish people, but because the attitudes they've formulated are so different and alien to the attitudes brought to America by other cultures since this country was formed."
"Attitudes like what?"
--
The sense of entitlement for starters not withstanding the belief that they not we belong here.
I'm waiting for him to flesh out what "attitudes" "Spanish people" have that are "alien" to all other attitudes in this country.
Maybe it's all those brown babies they have, or the hard work ethic they foster, or, maybe, it's because they're Catholics!
More likely is that Mojo Wire regrets making that statement and will just hope we all forget about it.
"If Dorgan manages to strip any form of a guest worker program (amnesty) by any name from the bill and succeeds, I'd advocate for his re-election."
first ask Dorgan what he's done to secure HIS state's border with Canada?
I wish you'd stop lying, Texas.
This is exactly what I posted the other day:
Federal Law--Section 8 USC 1324(a)(1)(A)(iv)(b)(iii)
"A person (including a group of persons, business, organization, or local government) commits a federal felony when she or he: assists an illegal alien she/he should reasonably know is illegally in the U.S. or who lacks employment authorization, by transporting, sheltering, or assisting him or her to obtain employment, or encourages that illegal alien to remain in the U.S. by referring him or her to an employer or by acting as employer or agent for an employer in any way, or knowingly assists illegal aliens due to personal convictions.
ILLEGAL HIRING:
Section 1324a states: "Any person who knowingly hires/harbors/transports any illegal alien is guilty of a felony punishable by 10 years jail + $2000 fine per illegal alien + forfeiture of the vehicle or property used to commit the crime".
Section 100.10 Criminal solicitation in the second degree.
A person is guilty of criminal solicitation in the second degree when, with intent that another person engage in conduct constituting a class A felony, he solicits, requests, commands, importunes or otherwise attempts to cause such other person to engage in such conduct.Criminal solicitation in the second degree is a class D felony.
In addition to the federal statutes....state laws and local ordinances controlling fair labor practices, workers compensation, zoning, safe housing and rental property, nuisance, licensing, street vending, and solicitations by contractors may also apply to activities that involve illegal aliens.
Prove that Conservative Republican Tom Tancredo KNOWINGLY hired illegal aliens to work for him, with a link.
Prove that he, when and if he learned that he did so, CONTINUED them in his employ, with a link.
Prove that he would, in the future, continue doing so and encourages others to do the same, with a link.
Prove those things.
Lacking that proof, you're just smearing Conservative Republican Tom Tancredo because you detest those who want the immigration laws enforced because you don't obey them yourself. How do I know this? You said so, and bragged about it.
Which polls are those? Can you cite one which asks the question of wheter we should secure our borders?
Prove to me he did.
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