Posted on 08/25/2005 2:40:22 PM PDT by Libloather
Dean’s immigration view too simple for problem
By Joseph Dolman, Newsday
Published: Sunday, Aug. 21, 2005
Poor Howard Dean.
The Democrats keep looking for their breakout moment. They keep searching for a way to show skeptical Americans they aren’t just hand puppets for a cast of familiar interest groups. They keep struggling to develop some fresh ideas.
Yet there was Dean – the party’s national chairman – on “Face the Nation” last Sunday, whiffing away at a fine chance to show Americans a smart Democratic mix of thoughtful policy and savvy politics on the crucial matter of immigration.
Host Bob Schieffer asked him to elaborate on his recent claim that the Republicans are out to “scapegoat” immigrants.
Dean waltzed his listeners down memory lane. The GOP scapegoated blacks in 2002 when it employed “quota” as a racial code word, he said.
(Well, maybe so.)
And, he noted, Republicans scapegoated gays in 2004 when the party pushed a mean and ugly drive against gay marriage.
(True enough.)
But now, insists the chairman, the evil GOP is “going after immigrants.” How? Hey, you have Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger welcoming the Minutemen – “vigilantes!” – to California, Dean replied.
And if that example sounds weak, don’t forget the GOP campaign to withhold drivers’ licenses from illegal aliens.
“They are clearly cranking it up because (Karl) Rove knows that people are mistrustful of immigrants,” Dean asserted.
But hold on just a minute. Dean is making this sound like a matter of conscience straight out of the civil-rights era. He’s making it sound as if the issue is whether we can find it in our hearts to trust outsiders.
What a maddening mistake. The Democrats would blunder disastrously if they chose to view the push for immigration reform as just another wedge issue, born and raised in Dr. Rove’s dark lab.
The truth is more complex.
Immigration lies at the heart of America’s genius. We take the motivated multitudes from around the world and adapt their energy and their ideas to meet our own needs.
And immigration lies at the heart of New York’s survival during the ’70s and ’80s, when other cities saw their populations quietly filter away. Immigration is a key reason the downstate region of New York flourishes today and the upstate region languishes.
At the same time, Democrats and Republicans alike ought to worry about the vast number of illegal immigrants – some 11 million strong and counting – who call America home.
For one thing, they’re ripe for exploitation – particularly from employers. For another thing, many of them labor off the books, which means they take billions of dollars a year out of our local tax bases.
And then there’s this point: If Washington can’t stop workers from coming over our borders illegally, it’s also baffled when it comes to protecting the home front from illicit drugs, illicit weapons and Islamic terrorists. We’re not bigots if we worry about this.
OK. I realize the Democratic chairman is not your basic policy-wonk position. The goal in Dean’s mind, I’m certain, is to frighten Hispanic voters away from the GOP and into the Democratic fold.
His tactic might work – but I doubt it. One reason is that the elected politicians of both parties grasp the issue better than Dean does.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., have put together a promising measure that would more easily match prospective immigrants with jobs available.
President Bush is working toward a similar goal. The idea on both sides is to fix our border problem and make a pitch for Hispanic voters. I’m not saying bigotry isn’t a factor in immigration politics. But the situation isn’t what Dean says. So, please, Howard, stop the guilt trip now. It isn’t working.
Neither of the "fixes" quoted in this article FIX anything.
Both parties are clueless as to what "We the people" want to see done. Both shall pay at the ballot box.
Either that or they decided no stupid bombs until after school starts. But yeah he's been muzzled for a few weeks, which is a shame.
I love how the Dems keep courting the favor of people who can't legally vote. Keep it up! It's working perfectly!
Even this RAT reported realizes howie is a screaming loon.
The Democrats keep looking for their breakout moment. They keep searching for a way to show skeptical Americans they aren’t just hand puppets for a cast of familiar interest groups. They keep struggling to develop some fresh ideas.
----
The DemoRats have no fresh ideas. They are not interested in fresh ideas. They have only one goal which is POWER AND CONTROL. It does not involve ideas, or what America needs, or what anyone needs. It involves only power and they will say anything, do anything, to anyone, to gain that power and control.
The leftist MSM keeps trying to scrape and scrounge for anything that might in any way, look like something credible the liberal socialists might "represent" -- sorry MSM, the only way the libs have anything IS TO LIE ABOUT IT!!!
The McKennedy bill does NOTHING to stop illegal immigration.
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