I'm on my way to work this morning and NPR is having a fund raiser. So, my normal morning routine of news is disrupted by the well-meaning, yet unlistenable requests for listeners, just like me! to donate now!
So, I flip through the AM radio dial, check out some Mike and Mike in the morning on ESPN 1000, Jerry Springer is on commercial on Air America...and hello dolly! Bill Kristol has just been invited on the Laura Ingraham show to discuss immigration. Joining him was David Frum. It was Weekly Standard vs. National Review. It was head in the sand "there's nothing wrong here!" vs. "Republicans better get this issue right!". It was, to say the least, actually quite illuminating.
Bill Kristol is officially not in favor of the current Sensenbrenner or Tancredo bills coming up through the House. He has said in numerous places that the Republican party will never win on a "restrictionist" platform in regards to immigration. Interesting how close "restrictionist" sounds like "racist" to the ears, isn't it?
Frum came on after Laura Ingraham had done a bit of race baiting (including the tidbit that when she saw footage of the massive demonstration in Los Angeles, she saw American flags used as masks and gags, and that they were "defiled" by the protestors). Frum argued that lower and middle-wage Americans were the voter base the Republican party had ignored for too long (duh!) and at their own peril. He posited that poorer Republican voters watched Republicans consistently vote in favor of the big money donors in terms of their views on immigration (duh!). Therefore, politically, Republicans needed to get out in front of this issue and "do something" or in November of '06 there would be a backlash.
Kristol retorted that Republicans are in serious trouble in November of 2006 immigration bill or no immigration bill. It's his argument that with unemployment steady, crime not on the rise (?!), there were no indicators that illiegal immigration and the presence of 11 million undocumented aliens was a big deal.
A quick aside. Note the implicit racism in Kristol's statement that crime isn't on the rise. The implication there is that those Mexicans could get out of control. Or the potential is there that we might have to address the problem if they start acting out of line. Ugh.
The two actually got a bit sharp with each other. I believe that Frum comes at this from a truly political standpoint. He is not a racist who wants to restrict the rights of Mexicans or any other nationality in this country for purely selfish (read: racist) reasons. He is, however, acutely sensitive, to the passion that runs through many of the voters in the Republican party. That passion being "Why the hell are my heating bills killing me, my floating interest mortgage starting to smart, and my gasoline bills really biting into the boat fund...ah, yeah..the wetbacks!"
See, fundamentally, racists are dumb. They blame outsiders for internal problems. It's easier than addressing the real issues. The reasons why poor Republicans are having a hard time finding jobs has nothing to do with Mexicans or any other illegal workers. Since when has competition threatened the average conservative? Isn't that the sort of Social Darwinism the party is built on? Of course, it's the "outside" influences that are causing you unhappiness...the mirror is the last place you'll ever look.
What was interesting was hearing how testy Kristol got with Frum. Clearly, Kristol thinks that taking the Republicans in the Tancredo direction is a losing proposition (which it is). And after the two debated, Ingraham played a clip of some woman (probably on a televised debate on this topic) stating that Tancredo was taking the Republicans in the direction of David Duke's old philosophy (and we all know what that means). She then played a clip a standard "radio soundbite" clip of a guy yelling "Shut up!" Yeah, it's hard to hear someone call you kloset klan member, isn't it?
Well, duh!