Troubled
Mood:  down
Does the President realize how unpopular his immigration plan is with most Americans, including, most especially, his political base? What the hell is he thinking of? I'll say it again: there is too little potential reward for the political risk of courting the Latino vote by granting what is essentially a blanket amnesty for illegal Mexican immigrants. Mexican-Americans on the Left may want no borders and easy terms for citizenship, but he's not going to get the votes of those relative few who actually do participate in electoral politics, anyway. And those who have been here for generations and who work hard and who endeavor to establish themselves among the middle-class through property ownership and assimilation don't particularly care to see a great influx of illegal aliens. Why? Because they know that it will force them to compete (and lose to) a whole new wave of low-wage laborers. So, in neither case does the President stand to gain anything. Plus, he pisses off conservatives who don't want to see more balkanization of the Southwestern United States.

I'm one of those people who didn't vote for Bush in 2000, but who instantly found his loyalty to the man in the aftermath of 11 September 2001. I have defended him time and again because of his righteous prosecution of the war against Islamofascism and the terrorists who promote that disease. But, he has done himself great political harm in the past several weeks with a lot of ill-considered ideas ---the immigration plan, in my view, being chief among them. Is it too late to emend his agenda? For his sake, he better hope not.