Wait...the current crop of Rs could look *less* Presidential?

I call bullshit.

Will they take the bait?

You must be joking. These are the Republicans we're talking about!

I fully expect the next GOP debate to be all about Anchor Babies and the choice of "mass deportation vs. all-out ethnic cleansing."

I get he's trying to appeal to the right, but it's just weird rhetoric. We have no official language, why would they have to learn English? Most illegal immigrants are crushingly poor. It's not like they're going to owe income tax, and a fine would be disproportionately punitive. We're probably going to have to talk about it this way to get anything passed but it just sucks to have to make apologies to people's fears when they have so little grounding in fact.

@2
i vote for ethnic cleansing. The various Armenians I've had the pleasure of interacting with have had a stoic humility about them (with a flash of pizazz here and there.) That sort of disposition in a person is something I find welcoming and attractive. Have no idea if it is due to their cleansing 100 years ago, but anyway, yammering away too much on Slog this afternoon.
Have a Nice and Safe Day :) (adapted from a border crossing sign going into Mexico)

I hope Obama is thinking about this and not just the political angle:

http://www.slate.com/id/2293628/

We HAVE to start making it easier for skilled workers to get visas, and make it much, much easier for them to stay long-term. So many people want to come here, including many of the world's smartest and most talented. But we do nothing but present obstacles, for two reasons: 1) white fear, and 2) Republican assholes.

I don't know, I thought the moat full of alligators was a pretty good idea.

@4 Seconded. And holding businesses accountable for hiring illegal immigrants should be even the MOST prominent thing to emphasize.

Legal immigrants always get grouped in with the illegal, so, as has been reported here, they are less willing to work or live in an area with known animosity and bias towards immigrants. Arizona is bleeding people.

Out will come the "fuck the immigrants, white folk is more than willin' to work dem jobs" rhetoric. This is so fucking accurate that last year, five months after INS stormed through Wenatchee, so many white folk were willing to pick-up the slack...

....that they had to hire 100 Jamaican guest workers.

http://www.wenatcheeworld.com/news/2010/…

And this from the comments: "I am a 39 year old, college educated white, strong (farm stock) American female and out of a job.I would do the work in a heartbeat."

Then WHY aren't you?

There's no fucking way that Goldman Sachs Presents Barack Obama stands up to business in any meaningful way and passes this thing with actual strong privisions for holding businesses accountable. Just like with the public option, it will be long gone before passage. Anyone want to guess how much Republican support he gets for the bill when he inevitably compromises and drops this aspect?

There are a couple of issues that I really wish that national-stage politicians would just shut the hell up about, and this is #1 with a bullet. There is nothing to be gained by engaging with this topic right now: the business community likes the status quo just fine, labor unions are gunshy about downward pressure on wages, there is no general enthusiasm for reform/amnesty, and the only people who get seriously excited about the issue are insane nativists.

If George W. Bush couldn't muster consensus for what was, objectively, a horrible guest-worker program, there is zero chance that Obama or anyone else is going to actually going to get any traction here, and all bringing up the issue does is sabotage the election chances of anyone half-sane in the southwest.

@ 4 English is our official language even if it is not official. And yes they should pay a fine they did break the law. Does't have to be huge but there should be a fine.

@ 10 Bush's immigration plan was great and I feel it could have been passed in 2006 when the Dems took over but we didn't want to give Bush a poltical victory, we played politics and we should not have. That was a great plan for our country.

He is not appealing to the right here he is appealing to the centrists and hell plenty of center-left Dems as well.

And I saw this a a child of legal immigrants who is brown.

Just draft any Republican CEO or CFO or COO of any of the firms that hire illegal workers and ship them to front-line combat units in Pakistan.

Problem solved.

Paul,
I completely agree with him. It's time people (anybody, not just those south of the border) take account of an illegal action. I do believe W. would agree. If he, Obama angers the Left so be it.

@3 Agree.

@11 I also read Bush's plan was fine.

" make the far-left base wail"

So, politics is your beat, eh?

I'd be fine with undocumented people paying a fine and registering. I think it's stupid that they have to learn English but whatever. You need it to be functional at most skilled jobs--I'd just not extend this to Chinese grandma who's kids brought here her or something.

All that said, let me tell you the statement from the pull quote that makes me laugh: "this [getting right with the law] is how we demonstrate that being — what being an American means."

ROFL. That's rich. Basically, if you're a dirty Mexican or other such foreigner you need to comport with the law. If you're a megarich criminal person or institution it's fine. Or if you're the President, ignoring the law is not just acceptable, it's accepted and cheered on by your loyal fanbase.

@15:
>implying that it's possible to get unemployment benefits without proper papers

18, Whites aren't Aryan, people of pure Northwestern European blood are Aryan, and few, if any people of Aryan stock are migrating to America, let alone illegally. Ethnicity plays a big role in my hope for the deportation of illegals, while I think all illegals should be shipped out, I also realize that most illegals are worthless turd world imbeciles who only hamper our countries productivity.

Seriously, somebody, why the fuck is this racist turd permitted to post here?

Fuck off, shithead. Go back to Stormfront. Or shoot yourself. I don't particularly care which.

@20 This is one of the stupidest, most ignorant parts of Nazi mythology. Aryans lived in India, Persia and other parts of the brown world you like to shit on with your dumb words.

@22 Also, you might want to go here and send in your samples to see how brown you really are:

http://www.oxfordancestors.com/

@7- Now that Obama has proposed alligators, you know the GOP is going to insist on crocodiles.