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.
Yeah, but Tancredo's so ham-handed it will work on this. Sorry, but he's setting the GOP up for political slaughter, and we lose big on a ton of other issues elsewhere. I did not know he was that eager to hand the Dems a major issue.
No, he's not ham-handed as you say. He has a view, a voice, and a popular one. He's setting up the GOP for political revival, if you listened to the people. Since you think Morris understands Hispanics, why not talk to some Black people? How about some Cubans? Guess what they think. BTW, nice way of floating that "Pickett's Charge" allegation. You think that one is going to capture conservative discourse?
I'm personally open to modifying the length of time, myself - in fact, it should be lengthened to a couple of years longer than for those who came in legally. But a setup similar to this is the best deal we can get.
The best deal "we" can get? Are you just floating ideas for somebody? Testing the waters? There's a better deal, a winner for the Republican party.
Mr. Morris also has a pretty good reputation for reading situations, and he has one heck of a track record.
Um, you're serious? Why don't you put his name in the FR search engine. BTW, he didn't read anything. This was made for him - his a public relations person, not an expert on immigration. My advice, he won't fly.
A an “angry white male”, I do not have a problem with immigration. What I have a problem with is the illegal part, the welfare/handouts, bilingualism and crime that has resulted. (Although my experience with most Hispanics is that they are extremely hard working). Where we have failed is in educating immigrants and insisting they become legal member of our country and integrate into the culture.
Let’s be honest, they are here, they aren’t going away, we can turn this into a positive.
Along with this Bush needs to spend time “discussing” what it means to be an American, that there are both benefits and responsibilities. Monthly talks for 30 minutes during prime time on TV would work for me. I suggest a review of the Bill of Rights, one-by-one, what do they mean and how do they apply to all. Watch the liberals scream, but it is a winning strategy. People want to be led, Bush can do it.
In case you haven't noticed, they've cleaned the GOP's clock in three straight elections. As a result SEVERAL major gun control bills have gone through, as well as a lot of other crap. We tried Prop 187, and conservatives in California lost much more than they gained. Yeah, you won on Prop 187, and it was a Phyrric victory.
Prop 187 passed with 59% of the vote. My source indicates that Latino voters voted against it by a margin of 46%, implying that 54% of them voted yes. Blacks and Asian voters voted yes by a margin of 52%.
Doesn't sound like the majority of the electorate thought it was a racist proposition. What put the Republican party behind the 8 ball was the gutless Republican leadership that caved to the post election leftist hysteria and propaganda. The leadership also failed to effectively fight voter fraud, as demonstrated by the way they left Dornan to twist in the wind after he was defeated through demonstrable vote fraud.
Since nothing has been done to stop the influx of illegal immigrants into California, the Rats took full advantage of it with their "accelerated naturalization" process, and the Pubs have lost more ground as a result. Now they are reduced to pandering.
And if Prop 187 was so popular among blacks, why do they still vote 90%+ for Democrats?
I could go on and on, but you don't seem to realize that what you are advocating is not a solution, but a continual decline in the Republican plaform.
Pandering Alienates Conservatives, not to mention those who may be legal immigrants. Furthermore, when you're supporting law-breaking, the Republicans cannot win through such a stand.
What has to be done is that Conservatives need to speak out when confronted with the nonsense argument of "racist". That's a Marxist tool, and we all know it. You can't show that you're afraid of that, for they feed off of that. You have to shove the argument back in their faces, state the facts, and show them for who they are. Furthermore, all this timidity is downright embarrassing. A conservative coaltion is what needs to be in the works, and I think that we can still take this country back if we have the courage to do so. However, the neo-con influence is strong, and they have to be weeded out or marginalized.
I don't think your question invalidates the fact that a majority those groups did support Prop 187 as a solution to a percieved problem. Hypothetically, if the Pubs had supported it better, post election, they may have picked up more permanent support from these groups.
But to answer your question, I think that, on other issues, the Rats offer more to these groups, which tend to be of lower income, than the Pubs *did*. (Notice the use of the past tense there.)
You make it sound simple, and it isn't. A conservative could come up with a cure for AIDS, cancer, and the common cold, and we'd still be called racist.
Welcome to reality. We've got to be able to sell our position to people, and be VERY good at it. Unfortunately, there were major mis-steps in the past, and as such, the hard-line tactics can't be sold without costing us more in the long run. Morris has come up with a plan that might need some tweaking, but it's a lot better than what Tancredo's come up with.
How much of the vote did Pat Buchanan get again? Less than one percent, IIRC.
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