Many in GOP Will Sit Out Bush Talk (Grassroots Angry Over Amnesty)

Los Angeles Times ^ | April 23, 2006 | Christopher Goffard and Jean Pasco

[nj26]

When President Bush arrives in Irvine on Monday morning to pitch his immigration reform plan, one of his party's best-known local standard-bearers will be maintaining a respectful — and politically careful — distance.

Dana Rohrabacher, the nine-term Republican congressman from Huntington Beach, generally supports the president, but disagrees with his immigration policies. So Rohrabacher plans to sit out Bush's speech to the Orange County Business Council.

"I don't want to be behind him looking glum and not applauding," Rohrabacher said. "So as not to be rude to the president — which I think is inexcusable — I think I'll just be staying away."

Rohrabacher's remarks reflect deep unhappiness within the GOP toward Bush's immigration stance, particularly in Republican Orange County, which is famous as a caldron of border-crackdown sentiment and where many Republicans criticize his guest-worker plan as amnesty for illegal immigrants.

Bush's decision to speak here might prove an embarrassing miscalculation, said John J. Pitney, a government professor at Claremont McKenna College who used to live in Orange County and worked for the national GOP.

"I'm not sure they had their O.C. antennae up," he said of White House schedulers. "They don't realize how complicated this issue is. It's possible this is a Daniel-in-the-lions'-den moment, but that's not really characteristic of this administration."

[wizardoz]

If by that you mean we have had about enough liberal Republican BS, I can't speak for #12, but you got me figured out.

I was talking about something on starbase's homepage.

[rock58seg]

Curious, I just got a letter in answer to one my complaints regarding amnesty and secure borders.

While it was mostly boilerplate, following official lines, I was not expecting her to live up to Tancredo's standards.

At least so far she has not voted for the Kennedy-McInsane bill.

[KCRW]

Why don't you share with us the specific immigration law that Bush is breaking?

[starbase]

I'm not throwing up flak, I'm just a big fan of streamlining. I think people are more willing to actually read a list if it doesn't sound too intimidating to start with. 22 techniques is kind of overwhelming.

Ah, I see. When I first put up the list another poster made a similar remark. But the problem is that if it's too simplified, but contains numerous subsections, then the reader still has to do a lot of work to unravel it all to understand what you're presenting.

When I said that to the other poster he said "Ah, I see, you're saying that if it was too simple it would be just that."

So you see, what makes the dubious collection effective in the first place, is that it has a certain degree of inherent complexity, and as such is difficult to convey in a simplistic form.

I boiled it down to as few fundamental techniques as I thought would describe the overall dialectic. Any less I was afraid would lead to distractive sub setting.

As far as "my" list containing a lot of misrepresentations, well I took it from actual news stories, so if that's what manipulators are using, then that's what I've presented. I guess the list can be considered my unique contribution to the field of propaganda, to be used in tandem with other sources and lists (such as the Logical Fallacies, which have also been compared to my modest collection.)

[zook]

That's an odd story. I married a woman from Taiwan and for her to get permanent status we simply had to show a marriage license and a ring. We didn't even have any kids.

[KCRW]

Good. Clearly you are paying attention to what is going on in your state and voting on those issues. This is exactly what we should all be doing.

[zook]

I'm not saying he's right wing. I'm saying that when you call yourself a Republican and you openly undercut your CIC that way--essentially kick the man when he's down--you've placed yourself into the margin.

Equally important is the fact that Bush's position on immigration (or something similar to it) is supported by a majority of Americans.

[Sprite518]

Yeah well when a bunch of us stop voting for the Republican party, and go third party that is going to be it.

[KCRW]

Wow- you get to vote for all of the representatives in both Houses and vote for President again? I guess you are one of the lucky ones.

Here is Wisconsin- I get to vote for a governor and only one congressman and one senator.

[nj26]

"We grudgingly got Alito after the President found out that the moderate Harriet Miers wasn't going to cut it."

A good example of how grass-roots conservative activism can make a difference. If those Republican Congresscritters get scared enough about GOP turnout in November, they'll vote against amnesty, too.

[starbase]

Why don't you share with us the specific immigration law that Bush is breaking?

This is so silly I'm not even going to waste my time addressing it. You unconditional Bush supporters are showing a severe dearth of intellect these days.

Personally I've never understood hero worship/groupiism. But I guess it fills a void in your life, otherwise you wouldn't be attracted to it.

You are, of course, aware of millions upon millions of illegal foreigners in our midst and that George has not directed the police to arrest them, or assigned the National Guard to the border, or done any number of other things to enforce our Law, as he is sworn to do.

If you are expecting me to play some pathetic game of quoting sections and numbers of laws then you are committing the same error of understanding that the GOP and George Bush are committing.

[Sprite518]

Bingo... Everyone wants to get mad at conservatives when the President has abandoned us and our conservative belief. We are not the problem.

[Moonman62]

There'll be plenty of illegals to go to the speeches Americans don't want to go to.

[Democratshavenobrains]

Did George W. Bush run as a tight borders advocate in 2000 or 2004? What did Republicans expect?

[savedbygrace]

It appears you are logic-challenged.

Your conclusion is a non sequitur.

[KCRW]

Clearly- you cannot answer the question.

Do you really believe that local and state police departments need George Bush to direct them to arrest illegal aliens?

Putting the National Guard on the border is not a bad idea, but before Bush can direct the National Guard to do anything, there has to be a declaration of war by Congress. Bush can also direct the National Guard if the individual states are willing to give that power to the President. The National Guard is controlled by each state, not by the President.

I am really surprised that you did not know that- especially everything that we went thru during Katrina. Bush asked the Governor of Louisianna for control over the National Guard in order to get control of the situation in NO. The governor denied giving that power to Bush.

Bush can send the regular military into these states, but of course, that would be breaking the states rights laws.

Basically, what you are demanding is for Bush to defend the immigration laws by breaking a whole bunch of other laws.

[winodog]

I thought we wanted the President to enforce existing laws such as not hiring illegals and protect the borders.

Are you telling us he will have to break laws to enforce laws?

[manwiththehands]

You better sit down for this, KC:

Don't have much democRat "slime" in my state (Ohio) to deal with. But we do have a boatload of Republican "good guys" to deal with: DeWine, Voinovich, Taft. Taft and our "Republican" majorities here are buried in scandal. And I'm doing what I can to get rid of the Taft legacy. I'm supporting (with my time, money, energy and vote) Blackwell for governor, who is a CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICAN.

The next best candidate we have for governor is Petro, but he's a Taft/RINO clone. Polls have Blackwell up by double digits. (PSYCHE!) Contrary to FReeper "RINO" mob mentality, CONSERVATIVES can win elections OVER "RINO's".

Just because I won't vote for every single candidate who sticks an "R" next to his name doesn't mean I'm voting FOR any democRat. That's not fair and patently dishonest.

And I'm part of nobody's "mob". Speak for yourself.

[Mojave]

I thought we wanted the President to enforce existing laws such as not hiring illegals and protect the borders.

The OBL types on FR want the laws to be broken and the borders to remain unprotected.

[Serenissima Venezia]

The elected officials are supposed to be representing the will of their constituents. When they won't do that and act on their own self-interest, they are the ones responsible for their own demise.