Posted on 07/08/2006 4:37:07 PM PDT by garbageseeker
LOS ANGELES - Former President Bill Clinton praised President Bush on Saturday for supporting reforms that would allow millions of illegal immigrants to seek citizenship but said the debate in Congress is being fomented by Republicans who want to divide America.
"I'm proud of him for doing it and I thanked him for doing it," he said of Bush during a "Cafe con Clinton" breakfast speech to the annual conference of the National Council of La Raza, the nation's largest Hispanic civil rights advocacy group.
Clinton said Bush's roots in Texas — which has one of the nation's largest Hispanic populations — have helped him view immigrants as people rather than statistics.
"It's hard to demonize people if you know them," he said.
But Clinton also argued that the nation's government is controlled by Republican ideological hard-liners who want to use immigration to divide Americans and distract them from issues such as the war in Iraq and the health care crisis.
Instead of equal opportunity, they support a "financial elite" because they favor "concentrated wealth and power," Clinton said.
"They believe in a government that is secret, unaccountable and that maximizes its own power," he said. "They really believe the world works better if they run it and we keep our mouths shut."
Clinton supported an immigration reform measure passed by the Senate that would provide a way for many of the estimated 12 million foreigners living in the country illegally to become citizens. A House-approved bill would make illegal immigrants felons and build 700 miles of border walls. House and Senate negotiators so far have not been able to work out a compromise.
Bush has said he wants to enforce the borders so fewer people sneak across but also provide a way for those already in the United States to become legal. He has praised Hispanic immigrants as hardworking and family oriented. Clinton used similar language in his own speech.
The message played well with La Raza, which opposes the House bill and whose current president, Janet Murguia, was an assistant in the Clinton White House.
Before Clinton's speech, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa noted a string of rallies over the immigration issue, including one in March that sent 500,000 people into the streets of Los Angeles and garnered international attention.
"You literally reshaped the political landscape of our nation ... we can still see a movement blooming before our very eyes," he said.
Both Democrats and Republicans have been looking for ways to court Hispanics, whose fast-growing population gives them the potential to become an enormous voting force. Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove, was scheduled to address the convention on Tuesday
I think you are on to something. And what gets me is the tough anti-terrorist talk that comes from Republicans but they don't address the issue that people over stay their VISAs and most terrorist are crossing from Canada. We need real Border Security not an immigration bill. Let the laws on the books dry up demand for illegal workers. And lets pass real Border Security reform.
And this comes as a surprise to .....whom?
Not that they haven't tried several times already. He is one of a kind. We need a lot more like him.
He isn't rethinking anything. Did you watch the interview with Larry King this week?
We'll never dry up the demand for illegal workers until we start jugging the businessmen who are coordinating the mass-importation of illegals and buying off the RNC.
Encana, a Canadian-owned exploration & production company whose main interest is drilling for natural gas, cranked up a play in the U.S. section of the Rockies a couple of years ago, in Colorado. They brought in Chinese drilling rigs and Chinese crews -- die-cut, prefab deal. They had help from inside people in the Administration in getting clearances and L-1's or H-1B's for all those Chinese rig hands, under the radar. Nobody in the business press knew anything about the rigs until one of them was already in the country and its crew were getting ready to move onto their first drilling location.
How about them apples?
That's the kind of thing I'm talking about.
This should be entertaining when the Bushbot-La Raza-Open Borders clique shows up.
I think Jimmy Carter weighed in as well with his praise as did all the Democrats in the house and Senate.
"If conservatives felt that they had nothing to lose [after the destruction of the Democrat Party], they would bolt the GOP for greener pastures to the right, and perhaps form a conservative party strong enough to challenge the GOP."
Perhaps, but probably not. And your scenario didn't consider conservatives bolting for the exact opposite reason -- they see the current GOP with its monstrous spending, open borders policy, etc. and conclude that the differences between the two major parties have now become insignificant enough to safely bolt the GOP.
So, if your hypothesis is correct, the GOP is screwed either way -- If they expand the party by expanding conservative ideas and get the electorate to understand them and agree with them (iow, what they should be doing), the party conservatives will bolt, feeling they have nothing to lose. (Personally, I think this worry is unjustified). And if they cater to the center/left by "stealing their issues," the conservatives will bolt as well (albeit for an entirely different reason).
Obviously, my preference is for the GOP to go on the offensive and annihilate the Rats, letting the chips fall where they may. Odds are, if they employ this strategy, they'd be sitting prettier than ever. And if they don't, who gives a Rat's ass -- the country will be better for it.
What's next? Montel?
I think DoJ's problem is political.
.....to [Jeb] Bush to [Chelsea] Clinton to....
Hell ;)
LOL
bump
Well, he reshowed it tonight. If you have taken your blood pressure pills you may want to watch-- especially about 20-25 minutes in to the interview.
Reshowing it tonight -- will be on again in an hour -- listen to the part about 20 - 25 minutes in where he recants what he had said earlier in the very same day.
Maybe they had a power outage in the WH basement...
I wonder where they went. I was waiting to read their comments.
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