Posted on 05/19/2011 7:22:57 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
I don’t know, guys. We’ve reached the point where the “Newt implosion” narrative has crystallized so thoroughly that every new story about him ends up being refracted through that prism. I don’t trust my own judgment at this point. Is this new bit genuinely toxic, as Ace’s co-blogger Gabe seems to think, or is it much ado about nothing?
Newt Gingrich, whose campaign for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination has gotten off to a rocky start, risked fresh controversy on Thursday by suggesting that some illegal immigrants living in the United States “may have earned the right to become legal.”…
Gingrich recounted how World War Two-era U.S. draft boards chose who would serve in the military, saying a similar system might help deal with the millions of immigrants living in the United States illegally.
“Because I think we are going to want to find some way to deal with the people who are here to distinguish between those who have no ties to the United States, and therefore you can deport them at minimum human cost, and those who, in fact, may have earned the right to become legal, but not citizens,” Gingrich said.
Here’s the complete quote via Radio Iowa:
“This is, at the risk of — as I do on occasion — of getting into trouble with the news media,” Gingrich said, in answering the question, and a few people in the audience chuckled. “…I’m looking seriously at the way the Selective Service Act used to work in the 1940s and World War II where a local Selective Service board who knew the local people made the decisions…because I think we are going to want to find some way to deal with the people who are here to distinguish between those who have no ties to the United States and therefore you can deport them at minimum human cost, and those who, in fact, may have earned the right to become legal, but not citizens.”
That’s not totally alienating to the conservative base, right? You can imagine local amnesty draft boards designating illegals who’ve served in the military for special legalization privileges. (We already do it, kinda sorta.) As well as anyone else who has “ties to the United States,” which, er … could be millions of people.
Seriously, am I misreading this? Or does Newt know something about the imminent zombie apocalypse, leaving him willing to antagonize grassroots righties at every turn knowing that none of it will matter come Sunday? Exit quotation: “My reaction is if you’re the candidate of very dramatic change, it you’re the candidate of really new ideas, you have to assume there’s a certain amount of clutter and confusion and it takes a while to sort it all out, because you are doing something different.”
Update: Greenroomer Patrick Ishmael e-mails to say that Newt made these comments in Waterloo, Iowa. And he is, apparently, a big Abba fan. So I guess this is obligatory…
Geez, it would probably end up being led by a WH appointee. What a disaster a program like that would be.
Why are he even discussing a ompromise on this subject. It would all be very simple if the laws were just enforced.
Don’t worry Newt, I heard today that Chuckie Schumer feels sorry for you.
Ron Paul has some competetion, it would seem. Meth is reaching the highest levels.
I think it’s a great idea!
We could have local boards that deport people too.
And why stop there? We could have local boards that decide who should receive health care and who shouldn’t!
And maybe even local boards that exempt entire companies from healthcare laws!
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This guy is really turning into badnews.He is infected by the swamp gases of dc.
From the absurd to the sublime.
As I posted previously about Newt, he’s toast before he was ever bread!!
“What if we had a fence?”
Ping!
Newt is nuts. The clown opens his mouth and sends missives ricocheting all over worse than a .22 rf fired across a pond of still water.
What if we had local boards who could pay for and transport illegal aliens back across the southern border?
This RINO has-been has gone over the edge. Every idea he now has seems to turn intelligent dialog to crap.
newt is being a poster child to the media which is making the GOP look bad, his has-been attitude needs to go away for good. someone shut him up please.
How do you legalize illegals? Pretty soon, you'll legalize murder and rape; and grant them amnesty.
I can just hear him now:
"She deserved to be raped so we need to grant the rapist amnesty... I'm Newt Gingrich and I approve of this message."
I don't know who's nuttier; Gingrich or McCain.
How could I have been SO wrong...
The ones that keep getting rewarded are the politicians that have done nothing over 20 years about the border. Did you vote for any of them? Did you see any of the ones you voted for go all out to make border control the top issue? Were you one of the people on here bashing Buchanan? Im not saying you specifically but just raising the point. We , the votets, let them in.
You started your post ok, identfying the mess of deporting someone to a country who for all intents and purposes they never lived in. That is an estute point. But then to turn and say give that person a crash course in the language of the country where they are to be sent? That takes what you identified as a complex issue and trivializes it.
Something certainly must be done. But If anyone thinks it will be possible to deport them all just do the math. How many buses would it take just for starters? 12 million people at 50 people per bus.
Hey, how you doing? Remember the last time we talked. It was that thread where you were elequently supporting Newt. LOL. Weve all been there. No worries. Assessments change.
I just got back from a three week vacation (25th Wedding Anniversary!)
Isn’t Newt gone yet?
Newt has truly come undone. He has never considered that US residency allows one to live in (and use the benefits of) the *entire* US?
Allowing local authorities the power to decide who gets to live in the entire US is a textbook case of a decision level mismatch.
This is especially true given that we already have municipalities that openly flout US immigration law, widespread abuse of such institutions is a certainty, I.e. US residency will be handed out like candy.
Again: giving someone US residency (and eventually citizenship) allows a wide array of benefits and privilege that is provided by the rest of the US population in its entirety. Hence, deciding who gets to join the club is a federal responsibility.
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