Bush is kicking away his base

The conservative movement that elected Ronald Reagan twice, George H.W. Bush once, and George W. Bush II twice, is essentially a movement of grass-rooters who don't like to take orders from the top and who revolt when they believe they are betrayed or bossed by those they elected. That's why the grass roots abandoned the first George Bush when he reneged on his "no new taxes, read my lips" promise.

The tough political tactics used by union bosses and Democratic machine bosses simply don't sit well with conservative Republicans.

Resentment against the current Bush administration is still festering about the combination of threats and bribes that pushed through close votes in Congress to pass the costly Medicare prescription drug bill in 2003 and Central American Trade Agreement in 2004.

Maybe the intra-party divisions between fiscal vs. Big Government conservatives that lay behind the former battle, and between pro vs. anti free-traders in the latter battle, were evenly balanced enough that the Bush administration alienated only a handful of Republicans. But in demanding a guest-worker plan that smacks of amnesty, the Bush administration is taking the unpopular side of a party division that is at least 80-20.

In December, the House passed a border-security bill authored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis.. The bill rejected support for Bush's guest worker/amnesty plan. Since 88 percent of Republican House members voted for this bill, that should have been a wake-up call to the president.

Shortly thereafter, Arizona Republican National Committee member Randy Pullen gathered enough signatures to present a resolution to the Republican National Committee at its Jan. 19-20 meeting in Washington, D.C., which endorsed border security measures and opposed any guest worker plan.

A competing resolution endorsing border security plus a guest worker plan was floated by the RNC's Bill Crocker of Texas. After he realized the strong tide against guest workers, he began negotiating a compromise with Pullen, and one version of the compromise eliminated guest workers.

When the RNC resolutions committee met Jan. 19, the chairman, Idaho's Blake Hall, brought up the original Crocker resolution that included guest worker language. An attempt by one committeeman to substitute the Crocker-Pullen compromise was ruled out of order, and then a motion to remove the guest worker language was voted down 5 to 3.

That evening, the Bush administration sent in its big guns, Vice President Dick Cheney and Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., to insist that RNC members support the guest worker plan or else they would be labeled disloyal and disrespectful of President Bush. Republican Party chairman Ken Mehlman made the rounds to regional caucuses to demand approval of Bush's guest worker plan and defeat of the Pullen resolution.

At the RNC meeting on Jan. 20, the Hall-approved resolution was incorporated and passed as part of a package of nine resolutions in order to preclude a specific vote on the border security-guest worker issue. The Pullen resolution did not come up.

This donnybrook happened on the same day that the New York Times reported that 18,207 illegal immigrants from nations other than Mexico have been the beneficiaries of the Bush administration's scandalous "catch and release" procedure in the three months since Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff promised to "return every single illegal entrant - no exceptions." Catch and release means that the illegal immigrants from nations other than Mexico are not deported. But after they are apprehended, they are released on their own recognizance with instructions to reappear a few weeks later, with everybody understanding that they will disappear into the U.S. population.

Also on the same day, Lou Dobbs reported on CNN-TV that Mexican troops are crossing our southern border twice a month in uniform, in military vehicles and carrying military weapons. The Bush administration's response to this invasion is don't ask, don't tell.

It's bad enough that President Bush is pursuing a vastly unpopular guest worker-amnesty plan, but the administration's bullying to prevent debate and a vote by the full Republican National Committee was intolerable. It forecasts the sort of intimidation we can anticipate in the upcoming Senate debate about Bush's guest worker plan.

Why are President Bush and Karl Rove so tone deaf on this issue? Some speculate that the Bush administration is in the pocket of big business lobbying interests that want the cheap labor made available by the government's failure to enforce our immigration laws.

Others speculate that Bush and Rove are hallucinating that Hispanics will vote Republican. That won't happen; Hispanics vote 55 to 75 percent Democratic because, since they are mostly in the low-income sector of our economy, they vote for the party that promises the social benefits of the welfare state, not for the party that pretends to support fiscal integrity and small government.

The administration-imposed RNC defeat of the majority view of Republicans is bad news for the 2006 congressional elections. Bush is alienating his political base and creating what one RNC member calls an "enthusiasm deficit." In the words of the old adage, elephants (i.e., conservative Republicans) never forget.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11116179/

Partial transcript from last nights Scarborough Country:

Welcome to SCARBOROUGH COUNTRY—no passport required, only common sense allowed.

But, first, a SCARBOROUGH COUNTRY exclusive. Is a dangerous South American gang planning attacks along the U.S.-Mexican border? Well, that‘s a shocking report from California and a newspaper that has obtained secret U.S. government documents. According to a captured member of a deadly drug cartel, there‘s a secret attack planned and it‘s a plan that calls for members of the gang to gather in Mexican border towns, and then attack the United States using the same route they use to smuggle drugs.

It‘s all contained in Homeland Security documents obtained by “The Inland Valley Daily Bulletin” that are apparently not being shared with local law enforcement officers at the border.

Here to talk about it, we have Sara Carter. She has been breaking news on this story for “The Inland Valley Daily News” (sic) and she joins us live from Los Angeles.

Also with us, MSNBC political analyst Pat Buchanan and NBC terror analyst Steve Emerson.

Sara, let‘s begin with you.

Two shocking findings from your reports. First, talk about these international gangs that are planning attacks along the U.S. border. What can you tell us tonight about these documents that you have obtained by the Department of Homeland Security?

SARA CARTER, “THE INLAND VALLEY DAILY BULLETIN”: Yes, it is shocking, Joe. You are right.

We have obtained a document that shows that MS-13 gang members, along with what they believe to be rebels from Guatemala, are planning attacks on our local law enforcement, officials all along the Southwest border. It came to me just recently, this week, and I was able to verify the document.

SCARBOROUGH: And so, they are actually talking about attacks—international gangs are actually talking about attacking our local law enforcement officers so they can control some of these border towns. Do you have any information as to why local law enforcement officers that could have been the target of those attacks weren‘t notified by the Department of Homeland Security?

CARTER: It‘s baffling.

None of the local law enforcement officials ever received any documentation from the Department of Homeland Security to warn them of these attacks. I contacted several of them today. And all of them told me the same thing, that they are changing their modus operandi on the border and that they will now be preparing for this.

These have been rumors about this for the last maybe two or three weeks. They have noticed an uprising and attacks on local law enforcement officials as well as Border Patrol agents. But now with the document, they have said that they will be changing the way they operate on the border and securing their deputies, and their sheriffs, as well as Border Patrol agents who are patrolling the Southwest border.

SCARBOROUGH: Sara, stay with us because I want to talk about the possibility of these international gangs and others smuggling into the United States to pass along to Iraqis and al Qaeda members.

But, first, I want to get a response.

Let‘s go to Pat Buchanan right now.

Pat, I‘ll tell you what. This is an explosive issue. You are talking about an invasion of at least, along the border, of—invasion of these border towns. What‘s going on? And look behind us; why isn‘t Congress, why isn‘t the president of the United States, who is going to go up and speak to the American people tomorrow about keeping America safe, why aren‘t they concerned about protecting our borders?

PAT BUCHANAN, NBC POLITICAL ANALYST: I don‘t understand this, Joe.

The gang, MS-13 is Mara Salvatrucha. I have read myself in the last two weeks where they have a policy called green-lighting, whereby they are authorized to assassinate police and others who have been traders. And I have heard myself. And I have got reports I have been working on that they have been invited by some of the drug cartels to come down and start shooting Border Patrol agents for the reason that the Border Patrol is getting more aggressive.

(CROSSTALK)

SCARBOROUGH: Killing Americans.

BUCHANAN: Killing Americans.

SCARBOROUGH: We have got international gangs that are going to come across our border and kill American law enforcement officers?

BUCHANAN: Gangs are right here. There are 6,000 MS-13 right out in Fairfax County. They green-light people. They have killed people out in the Shenandoah Valley. These people are in the country, Joe. Mara Salvatrucha, MS-13, probably has 10,00 to 15,000 people in the United States.

SCARBOROUGH: Pat, explain to me why we have got Border Patrol agents, why we have got local sheriffs, Americans, with targets on their back. We have got Sara, who has uncovered these documents from the Department of Homeland Security, and our local law enforcement officers haven‘t been notified.

BUCHANAN: Only one explanation why Homeland Security wouldn‘t raise Cain about this and the only explanation I can think of, and I don‘t know it for sure, is that George Bush has an open borders policy. He has got a guest worker policy he wants to get through Congress in February. And you start talking about gangs green-lighting Border Patrol agents on our border, and it will knock a hole in that, Joe, and what you will get is overwhelming support for the security fence on the American border that the House of Representatives voted in December.

SCARBOROUGH: And, you know, Steve Emerson, it reminds me of what was happening before September 11. You actually had the president of the United States that was talking about a general amnesty program for three million Mexicans before 9/11; 9/11 came along. He had to back off of that.

But now you have got, again, four years after 9/11, some pretty shocking reports. What is going on? I would guess, Steve, you would consider securing our borders as being integral to protecting our nation.

STEVE EMERSON, NBC TERRORISM ANALYST: Both borders. The Canadian border and the Mexican border are absolutely pivotal to securing our country, because it‘s clear that al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, all other radical Islamic groups have figured out that they don‘t need to enter our border through the ports, through the airports any longer.

They just need to enter it through the borders, through Mexico or through Canada, and that they can do so with almost impunity at this point. And you know that, Joe, that, at this point, the seriousness with which we have attacked the security at our borders is a joke.

And, so, therefore, al Qaeda can basically initiate any type of penetration at will. And we know that.

SCARBOROUGH: But, Steve, I have got to ask you why. “TIME” magazine reported a year ago that al Qaeda members and other Arab terror groups were focusing on the Mexican border to smuggle weapons across it, come to Middle America and launch attacks all across this country.

If that‘s the case, if we have known that for over a year, why is it that the southern border is still being ignored by this administration and this government?

EMERSON: Look, I can only speculate, because I can‘t figure out why there haven‘t been more resources put on to it.

I can only speculate that unless and until a major act of terrorism is carried out by somebody who actually infiltrates by means of the southern border, then we‘re not going to be put enough resources into it. We are not going to take it seriously until that actual contingency occurs.

SCARBOROUGH: Unfortunately, it‘s going to—it looks like it‘s going to—we are going to have to have another terror attack against this country before our government leaders take it seriously.

Now, Sara, we contacted the Department of Homeland Security. And they said they need to review the reports further, but that—quote—“our primary mission is to deny individuals and weapons of mass destruction from crossing our border illegally.”

And it seems to me, Sara, you are finding these documents that come from the Department of Homeland Security, but then they are turning around and shooting them down, like, for instance, another document you found that talked about the possibility of international terrorists shipping explosives across our border taking them up to Iraqi nationals living in the San Francisco area. Tell me about that.

CARTER: Yes.

I was able to find a document from the Department of Homeland Security that issued a warning, an alert, actually—it was an intelligence report that issued a warning about four Mexican nationals that would be delivering plastics, bombs, to an Iraqi national living in the San Francisco Bay area.

And, Joe, I was just listening to you earlier talk about the border and the terrorism, and the national security threat that our borders pose. I have been down to the border many times. And I have told you that before. I have basically been to areas where I could walked in and out of the United States from Mexico and no one would have known the better.

Well, I‘m just a reporter. If I could do that, I imagine somebody with training could do that as well, much easier than me. So, it is fascinating to me that the Department of Homeland Security continues to downplay their own reports. But yet our borders are left wide open. And, basically, anybody can come in and out of them.

SCARBOROUGH: Pat Buchanan, al Qaeda has to know that tonight.

BUCHANAN: Oh, sure, they all know it. They could walk in easily in, in here. I don‘t even know, why, though, they would bother. They have got some other means.

But let me say this on that border. You have got Zetas, who are basically Mexican Green Berets who have gone over and joined the cartel, who are now down there in Nuevo Laredo. You have got folks coming across the border. Mexican soldiers have been found on our side of the border last week. “Washington Times” had it.

The sheriff‘s went down. They saw the guys with mounted machine guns on our side of the Rio Grande. Joe, we‘re headed for a border war. And the president of United States—in my view, by year 2008, we‘re going to have that border defended as well as we have got the border of South Korea.

SCARBOROUGH: Steve, final thoughts?

EMERSON: Listen, we invent all these terms, OTMs, other than Mexicans, SIA, special interest aliens. These are euphemisms because we don‘t want to mention the fact is that we‘re worried about Arab males coming over. We‘re afraid to mention them because of the racial sensitivity.

The fact the matter is, there is a security problem, the magnitude of which we don‘t want to admit. And until and unless we take cognizance of this, we‘re going to have a serious problem. And Pat is right. This is a problem that we‘re staring face down and we are not recognizing it.

SCARBOROUGH: No doubt about it, Steve Emerson. Thank you.

Pat Buchanan, thank you, as always.

And, Sara Carter, please keep up the reporting down there. You are bringing to light some very disturbing facts that our own government, for some reason, doesn‘t want us to know.

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