I'm Running for Mayor of South Podunk: Immigration and the Republican Field

Newt caused quit a stir at the foreign policy debate with his stance on immigration (emphasis mine):

So I think you've got to deal with this as a comprehensive approach that starts with controlling the border, as the governor said. I believe ultimately you have to find some system -- once you've put every piece in place, which includes the guest worker program, you need something like a World War II Selective Service Board that, frankly, reviews the people who are here. 


If you're here -- if you've come here recently, you have no ties to this country, you ought to go home. period. If you've been here 25 years and you got three kids and two grandkids, you've been paying taxes and obeying the law, you belong to a local church, I don't think we're going to separate you from your family, uproot you forcefully and kick you out.

The Creeble Foundation is a very good red card program that says you get to be legal, but you don't get a pass to citizenship. And so there's a way to ultimately end up with a country where there's no more illegality, but you haven't automatically given amnesty to anyone.

Gingrich was referring to The Krieble Foundation plan, here.

Newt's idea of a "Board" to review people is rather odd, it seems.  Mark Steyn makes the point:

So the North Podunk Town Meeting could vote to deny you your Green Card but ten miles down the road the burghers of South Podunk could vote to give one to your cousin? That sure sounds like a plan.

It’s a tribute to Mitt Romney’s soporific caution and Herman Cain’s blithe indifference to the bit on the map marked Rest of the World that Newt is now what passes for the GOP’s deep thinker.

And why should this be the problem of the folks in South Podunk, anyway?  Maybe Newt hasn't thought that one through.

And is Newt offering amnesty as Bachmann claims...:

Well, I don't agree that you would make 11 million workers legal, because that, in effect, is amnesty. And I also don't agree that you would give the DREAM Act on a federal level. And those are two things that I believe that the speaker had been for, and he can speak for himself.

And as Romney claims...:

 “Newt Gingrich supported the 1986 amnesty act, and even though he conceded that was a mistake, he said that he was willing to repeat that mistake by extending amnesty to immigrants who are illegally in the country today," Romney adviser and spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom said in the spin room following the AEI/Heritage Foundation debate in Washington, DC.

I don't think Newt is offering amnesty to all.  He said, "there's a way to ultimately end up with a country where there's no more illegality, but you haven't automatically given amnesty to anyone."


Andrew McCarthy says Newt is just offering "common sense":

All he said was, “Let’s be humane in enforcing the law.” That was my reaction last night when Newt Gingrich argued that the federal government should refrain from deporting illegal immigrants who had been in the U.S. for many years if the effect would be the break up of a family.

I did not take him to be proposing a new law conferring amnesty. To do what the former Speaker proposed would require no change in U.S. law. All you’d need is the sensible application of prosecutorial discretion.

Part of the argument, though, seems to be about "magnets."  Romney fired back at Newt during the debate and insisted that not to deport them all would be legitimizing a magnet and serve as an incentive for others to come:

Look, amnesty is a magnet. What when we have had in the past, programs that have said that if people who come here illegally are going to get to stay illegally for the rest of their life, that's going to only encourage more people to come here illegally. 

Andrew McCarthy again:

In my mind, if you are in the country without authorization and we elect not to use our power to kick you out, you are the recipient of humane treatment and a very valuable benefit. You don’t rate more than that. We simply leave you alone: You don’t get the windfall of some sort of legal status, we don’t make it easier for you to work, and it’s not our job to relieve your anxiety over your status — you brought that anxiety on yourself when you entered or stayed illegally. If being here without authorization is causing you grief, go home and try to come back through the legal process. If you don’t want to do that, you takes your chances — period.

Now that, to me, is common sense.  I'm for the McCarthy plan!  We leave you alone.  If you're here illegally, you don't get free social services, you don't get to vote, you don't get a driver's license, you don't get in-state tuition in Texas or any other state.  If you're a criminal, terrorist, drug user, or other burden on society, we'll use our resources to deport you.  Is that a "magnet"?  Probably.  So secure the border, already.

I think it is, frankly, unrealistic to think that with the current staffing of ICE that we would or could deport every illegal.  I also think Newt makes a bit of sense when he suggests we must be humane about it all. 

It's sort of like this Republican field.  There's no perfect answer.  There's no real conservative option. 

On Out of Control Government, "Local Issues," the Taliban, Hiroshima, and Noonan

I've got another busy day ahead.  I've got some business to take care of this morning and then Steve and I are taking the afternoon off and getting massages at one of the casino spas.  Neither of us has ever had a "professional massage" so I'm looking forward to this.  I'm sure I'll be addicted.  The literature assures me it will alleviate stress and "release toxins" from my body.  Heh.  Okay.  I'll go for that!

Around the web a couple of things have caught my eye which I don't have time to get into very deeply this morning.  Enjoy this pretty picture (left) that my niece took, and consider...

This column from Charles Krauthammer.  As usual, I agree 100% and it sort of goes to my Farm Dust post earlier in the week.  Governing by fiat.  The money quote:

In the modern welfare state, government has the power to regulate your life. That’s bad enough. But at least there is one restraint on this bloated power: the separation of powers. Such constraints on your life must first be approved by both houses of Congress.  That’s called the consent of the governed. The constitutional order is meant to subject you to the will of the people’s representatives, not to the whim of a chief executive or the imagination of a loophole-seeking bureaucrat.

This post by Pundette, which addresses the goofy comment by Robert Gibbs that Obama doesn't want to weigh in on "local matters."  Pundette:

A local matter. What a cowardly approach to an issue that most Americans care about intensely. Obama's missing something essential: Basic love of country? Common human sympathy?

And she quotes Rush, who said,

Isn't this fascinating? Not gonna get involved in local decision making. Wouldn't you love to be hearing that in Arizona? Let me ask you a question, was it just New York that was attacked on 9/11, or was it the country? It was the country, was it not? United States of America was attacked on 9/11. They're getting involved in our local health care decisions. They're getting involved in the kind of cars that we buy. They are getting involved in virtually every aspect of our lives they can insert themselves.

No kidding.

This column at Fox in which the son of Brig. Gen. Paul W. Tibbets, Jr. laments the decision to send our Japanese ambassador to the Hiroshima commemoration.  He sees it as a sort of apology and says his father would not have approved:

"It's an unsaid apology," Tibbets, 66, told FoxNews.com from his home in Georgiana, Ala. "Why wouldn't it be?  Why would [Roos] go? It doesn't make any sense.  "I know it's the anniversary, but I don't know what the hell they're trying to do. It needs to be left alone. The war is over."

I heard Oliver North speaking to Sean Hannity about this earlier in the week and he was equally outraged. The ambassador did not give a speech at the event, but some quoted in this piece believe the U.S. should apologize for dropping the bomb.  I have no doubt that Obama will get around to that.


And finally, consider this post from Andy McCarthy in which he notes the fact that our government still has not designated the Taliban as a terrorist organization.  WTF?!

Yesterday, after three months of delay, the State Department finally issued its congressionally mandated annual terrorism report. It shows that the United States has not even designated the Taliban as a terrorist organization — not in Afghanistan, not in Pakistan.

I'd like to know the reasoning behind that one.  Read McCarthy's piece to see why this is such a big deal.

And if all that isn't enough to keep you going, here is Peggy Noonan lamenting the fact that America is at a boiling point and that for the first time, we don't expect our children to have things better than we did.  'Scuse me, Peggy, but weren't you over there singing glorious about the potential of The Great Obama, before the election?  Yeah.  Hush, now, okay?  Just, hush.

Hold the Line on Guantanamo

You've got to wonder what's really going on when Obama seems to cave into the opposition without too much of a fight. One doesn't, for example, see him saying, "Well, okay, health care reform is a bust for this year. The public just won't have it! We'll revisit this issue after we handle the economy." Nope. Not going to happen.

So The Washington Post story that Obama is caving on the New York trials for KSM and friends is a red flag. What's he really up to?

The Post gives us a clue:

If Obama accepts the likely recommendation of his advisers, the White House may be able to secure from Congress the funding and legal authority it needs to close the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and replace it with a facility within the United States. The administration has failed to meet a self-imposed one-year deadline to close Guantanamo.

Ah! So he'll agree to try KSM and friends in the military tribunal system IF he can bring the rest of the terrorists to the United States.

And he's got an ally:

Top Obama advisers have been negotiating with. Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) -- a vocal critic of trying the Sept. 11 suspects in civilian court -- in pursuit of a deal that would secure his help in closing Guantanamo. Graham has sought the creation a legal framework that would spell out how the government would detain and try future captives, but an administration official warned that a "grand bargain" is not likely in the immediate future. The official, also speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the talks with Graham have been mostly about "limited issues" involving the Mohammed trial and the future of Guantanamo.

What's Graham going to get out of this?

Andy McCarthy is on to this charade:

The real agenda here is to close Gitmo. That’s the ball to keep your eye on. The Post is trying to soften the opposition to shuttering the detention camp by portraying beleaguered, reasonable Obama as making a great compromise that will exasperate the Left. The idea is to strengthen Sen. Lindsey Graham’s hand in seeking reciprocal compromise from our side.

This, however, is a matter of national security, not horse-trading over a highway bill. You don’t agree to do a stupid thing that endangers the country just because your opposition has magnanimously come off its insistence that you do two stupid things that endanger the country.

If a deal to grant military commissions in exchange for closing Gitmo happens, it is a major win for the Obama Left and an enormous loss for public safety.

Michelle Malkin suggests we continue to call them out. This isn't an issue that merits compromise.

Ed Morrissey sees this issue as having an impact on the health care debate as well:

This may have some impact on the health-care debate as well. There have been suggestions that Obama would sacrifice his progressives and hoodwink the House into passing the Senate bill without seriously attempting to get the fixes House Democrats want made through reconciliation. After this retreat, Obama won’t dare cross the progressives on ObamaCare now — but they may be angry enough to demand a do-over to restore the public option. Just when Obama needed the Left to sit quietly so he could pass something on health care, he will enrage them on a key cause.

In either case, we don't want this lame health care boondoggle and we sure don't want Gitmo graduates on American soil. (And if this health care bill passes, you can bet the Gitmo guys will be getting better health care than the rest of us.)

Stay vigilant. Don't let this administration compromise on national security. As McCarthy said, there's just no reason to do it. Congress wasn't going to approve the funding to close Gitmo or renovate Thomson prison. Nobody in Congress wants THAT vote on their record heading into the midterms.

Hold the line.

(More at Memeorandum)

Republicans Need a Rollback Plan

Andy McCarthy's post at The Corner yesterday regarding health care reform is required reading. It's a subject a lot of people are sick to death of by now, especially after the televised summit last week, but McCarthy has a different perspective on where the Democrats might be headed from here and it's one I've totally been forecasting for some time now.

They clearly don't care about public opinion. The voters have made clear for months now that they are opposed to this plan. There are elements in it that people like and want, but many that they don't. But the Democrats don't care. Their strategy at this point is to ram it through no matter the costs (in both dollars and votes) and let the chips fall where they may.

McCarthy writes:

The Democratic leadership has already internalized the inevitability of taking its political lumps. That makes reconciliation truly scary. Since the Dems know they will have to ram this monstrosity through, they figure it might as well be as monstrous as they can get wavering Democrats to go along with. Clipping the leadership's statist ambitions in order to peel off a few Republicans is not going to work.

Pelosi is digging in. In a fundraising email she talks of "resolve" and says "history is within our reach." She tells the Sunday talk shows that she will have the 217 votes needed in the house to pass this monstrosity, even with the Senate's abortion language.

For McCarthy, it's clear that they will risk everything to get it through:

In the Democrat leadership, we are not dealing with conventional politicians for whom the goal of being reelected is paramount and will rein in their radicalism. They want socialized medicine and all it entails about government control even more than they want to win elections.

So how do you combat something like this? It's like the kamikaze pilots in World War II or the suicide bombers of today. They don't care what the cost, even if it's their own lives, the mission must be accomplished.

What Republicans need to do is start figuring out a way to roll this thing back once they return to power. I'm not saying give up the fight on stopping the health care bill, but have a plan for the future. McCarthy asks:

At the end of the summit debacle, President Obama put the best face on a bad day by indicating that he intended to push ahead with socialized medicine and face the electoral consequences ("that's what elections are for," he concluded). He's right about that. For Republicans, it won't be enough to fight this thing, then deride it if Democrats pull it off, and finally coast to a very likely electoral victory in November. The question is: What are you going to do to roll this back? What is your plan to undo this?

I'm wondering how much the next president is going to whine and moan about what he inherited from this one.

(AP Photo)

Andy McCarthy Gets My Blood Boiling (UPDATED)

In non-summit related news, Andy McCarthy knows how to get my blood pressure up, and not in a good way. While everyone was busy watching the summit or wondering if Charlie Crist is really going to run as an independent, McCarthy reports on the next chapter of Obama's war on the CIA.

This is typical Obama fashion: distract you with one issue then sneak another in the back door while you aren't looking.

From McCarthy:

While the country and the Congress have their eyes on today’s dog-and-pony show on socialized medicine, House Democrats last night stashed a new provision in the intelligence bill which is to be voted on today. It is an attack on the CIA: the enactment of a criminal statute that would ban “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.” (See here, scroll to p. 32.)

The provision is impossibly vague — who knows what “degrading” means? Proponents will say that they have itemized conduct that would trigger the statute (I’ll get to that in a second), but it is not true. The proposal says the conduct reached by the statute “includes but is not limited to” the itemized conduct. (My italics.) That means any interrogation tactic that a prosecutor subjectively believes is “degrading” (e.g., subjecting a Muslim detainee to interrogation by a female CIA officer) could be the basis for indicting a CIA interrogator.

McCarthy suggests that the Democrats waited until after the "politicized witch-hunt against John Yoo and Jay Bybee" concluded because to admit that waterboarding and other tactics were not illegal before would damage that "investigation." We had to "pretend" they were illegal before, but now that the investigation is over, we have to make it offically illegal.

So what does this provision make illegal, exactly? This:

Waterboarding is not all. The Democrats’ bill would prohibit — with a penalty of 15 years’ imprisonment — the following tactics, among others:

- “Exploiting the phobias of the individual”

- Stress positions and the threatened use of force to maintain stress positions

- “Depriving the individual of necessary food, water, sleep, or medical care”

- Forced nudity

- Using military working dogs (i.e., any use of them — not having them attack or menace the individual; just the mere presence of the dog if it might unnerve the detainee and, of course, “exploit his phobias”)

- Coercing the individual to blaspheme or violate his religious beliefs (I wonder if Democrats understand the breadth of seemingly innocuous matters that jihadists take to be violations of their religious beliefs)

- Exposure to “excessive” cold, heat or “cramped confinement” (excessive and cramped are not defined)

- “Prolonged isolation”

- “Placing hoods or sacks over the head of the individual”

Naturally, all of these tactics are interspersed with such acts as forcing the performance of sexual acts, beatings, electric shock, burns, inducing hypothermia or heat injury — as if all these acts were functionally equivalent.

Seriously? You can't "exploit the phobias of the individual"? What if KSM has a phobia of confined spaces? Or of people in uniform?

Prolonged isolation? How long is "prolonged" exactly?

McCarthy concludes with:

Here is the fact: Democrats are saying they would prefer to see tens of thousands of Americans die than to see a KSM subjected to sleep-deprivation or to have his “phobias exploited.” I doubt that this reflects the values of most Americans.

Amen to that.

Update: Thankfully, the bill has now been pulled:

A controversial bill that would have levied criminal punishments on intelligence officers for harsh interrogations was pulled Thursday evening.

House Republicans charged Democrats with trying to sneak a provision into the intelligence authorization bill that would establish criminal punishment for CIA agents and other intelligence officials who engage in “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment” during interrogations...

...

Republicans criticized the language and the way it was introduced.

“This will fundamentally change the nature of the intelligence community by creating a criminal statute governing interrogations,” said Rep. Pete Hoesktra (R-Mich.).

He added that it had appeared “out of nowhere” in a manager’s amendment.

“Would someone on the other side please explain the rationale behind this and why the majority was unwilling to have hearings on this issue?" he said.

On Thursday night, Hoekstra lauded the GOP effort against the bill.

"Republicans brought this to the attention of the American people, who were rightly outraged that Democrats would try to target those we ask to serve in harm’s way and with a unified push we were successful in getting them to pull the bill," Hoekstra said in a statement. "The annual intelligence bill should be about protecting and defending our nation, not targeting those we ask to do that deed and giving greater protections to terrorists."

Update: This is now a growing thread at Memeorandum.