Posted on 05/16/2002 12:24:37 PM PDT by hchutch
For its political survival, the Republican Party must court the Hispanic vote. Totally shut out among black voters and badly defeated among Hispanics, the GOP is having a hard time finding enough white voters to overcome the deficit. With blacks and Hispanics casting one vote in four, a Republican must win two-thirds of the white vote to have a shot at 51 percent in the average election.
And the situation will only get worse for the Republican Party. The Hispanic population, which swelled from 7 percent to 12 percent of the U.S. population in the past 10 years, is forecast to grow to 18 percent by the end of the decade. If they continue to vote Democrat, the GOP will run out of white people — and face death as a political party.
Only by taking the bold and dramatic step of providing amnesty to illegal Mexican immigrants can the GOP, at a stroke, become competitive among Hispanic voters. This legislation, the equivalent for Hispanics of the 1964 Civil Rights Act for blacks, holds the potential to reposition an entire slice of the electorate and move Hispanics to the Republican Party.
But, at the same time, the Republican Party needs to hang on to its base of angry white men who largely oppose immigration — and illegal immigration most of all. They are the base that insisted on English-only initiatives in the 1980s and 1990s, battled to cutoff aid to illegal aliens, and demanded a halt to bilingual education.
How are Republicans to reach out to Hispanics while appeasing their truculent base?
President Bush has already taken the lead in pulling the Republican Party back from the issue precipices on which it was dancing. By stopping Republicans from opposing bilingual education or affirmative action, and by demoting English-only initiatives to the bottom of the party’s agenda, he has moved mightily to strengthen GOP outreach to Hispanics.
But it is his amnesty proposal for illegal Mexican immigrants that holds the real hope for his party to avert demographic extinction.
The key to resolving the Republican dilemma of having to choose between outreach to Hispanics and alienating its Anglo political base is to condition amnesty with good citizenship requirements.
Republicans should offer conditional amnesty to Mexican illegal immigrants. Here’s the deal: If you want to stay in the United States, you must enroll in a good-citizen program. The immigrant has to agree to become functionally literate in English within two years, work for six of the next eight quarters and pay taxes to FICA (Federal Insurance Contributions Act) for each of these quarters — no off-the-books work — and avoid arrest for 24 months.
At the end of the two-year period, those who meet the requirements would become citizens in good standing, eligible to vote and participate in civic life. Those who refuse to enroll or who fail the meet the requirements would face deportation. If the program works, it can be expanded to other categories of illegal immigrants.
Polling shows that most voters, even among the GOP base, are willing to forgive the illegality of their arrival if these Mexican immigrants show a willingness to earn their legal status in America. The compromise has the contractual opportunity/responsibility formula that sold so many of Clinton’s programs and that lies at the core of the highly successful welfare reform program. By asking something in return for giving something, the resulting transaction acquires a moral impetus that it sorely needs to win national support.
At the same time as the Republicans offer the olive branch to illegal Hispanic immigrants, they must use this year’s review of immigration statutes to close down immigration from nations that sponsor or harbor terrorists — including even such so-called allies as Saudi Arabia and Egypt. By closing one spigot as they open the other, Republicans can master the political hat trick of reaching out to Hispanics while appeasing their political base.
Otherwise, the GOP will go the way of the Liberal Party in Great Britain, to the political grave.
What changed my mind, and in the end was most fortuitous, was WHO WOULD I WANT IN THE WHITE HOUSE IN THE EVENT OF A MAJOR CATASTROPHY OR WAR? That and that alone was my reason for voting for Bush. Even though I suspect Desert Storm may have had something to do with protecting Bush the younger's oil interests off the coast of Bahrain. And his daddy had oil interests off Cuba during the Bay of Pigs. But, the choices were few unfortuantely, so I picked Bush. The numbers were too close in my state.
Doing as you wish, to keep voting for the leser of evils is what has gotten us into this desperate position and at the same time, held 3rd parties back. We are turning into a democratic/socialist state right before our eyes, and frankly I'm not sure the process can be reversed anymore.
RESPONSE: There is no dilemma. The leadership of the GOP has sold America down the river. For what? Being elected so that they can engage in eating, drinking/drugs, copulating with boys and/or girls,evacuation, and snoring-all at our expense.
The intermarriage rate of Hispanics is incredibly high and I think that this is much less of a problem than you think. Stop illegal immigration and let a generation pass, and a Spanish surname will be commonplace and the voting patterns of those with a Spanish surname will not be so skewed toward the Democrats.
tom h (Hernandez)
Forget about it. We need a Republican President with the guts to declare Marshall Law, stop immigration, grab illegals by the collar and hurl them from the country, close our borders and put the military on them to shoot to kill, and turn back what both they and the democrats have done to our nation. Other than that to hades with all of them.
I don't buy into this slow process of disappearing white candidates over the decades. The inability to find employment unless you are Mexican. Gutless Republicans along with anti-American Democrats are responsible for this mess, both hoping it won't effect their voter base until they have had their lives and are in the grave. Let the next generations fight to get it back.
I won't vote for a candidate that doesn't address the problem, that means I vote for no one but Tancredo. I'm all for getting up out of my comfy chair and going to war for my kids future, so no, I won't help the Republican Party hang on, I'm all for pushing this mess to a head while I can still fight. Some things are just worth fighting and dying for. Our own politicans won't uphold the Constitution because it has no teeth in it, you think Mexicans are going to uphold it when they are in charge? ROFL, naw, I won't help Bush put us on that "fast track".
This is completely and utterly backwards! Alienating whites by pandering to Hispanics and blacks is what is destroying the Republican Party.
Whites still make up about 72% population. If you alienate 1% of the white vote by pandering to Hispanics, you need to gain 6% of the Hispanics to break even.
About half of the white population does not vote. Many because they are smart enough to see there is no difference between the Republicrats and the Demapublicans - both parties despise middle class and lower class whites. If a party truly represented the interest of "non-rich" whites, it would bring new voters into the polls.
Sorry, but those who think a third party can magically make things all better need a political reality check. I can't help it if they cannot take it.
So true.
40% of Hispanics voted FOR 187.
Plus, say what you will about his lifestyle, but Dick Morris's track record speaks volumes as well.
There are worse things than having a Democrat in the White House - like watching the Republican Party morph into a lame version of the Democratic Party!
Punishing Republicrats in `04 makes sense if they get the message that they have stabbed their core constituency - "non-rich" whites - in the back, and they won't win another election until they apologize.
40% of Hispanics voted FOR 187.
Dick Morris's reputation and ability as a pollster speaks for itself. This guy bailed Clinton out after the 1994 election. I find his personal lifestyle (Cheating on his wife with a hooker) to be offensive, but I'd be foolish to disregard his comments on political matters.
The political equivalent of Pickett's Charge is NOT what I have in mind.
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