Ok, so for the sake of argument, let’s just say that Karl Rove and the growing number of other Republicans are right. That the Republican Party simply has no hope of winning the 2016 presidential election by continuing to focus only on white voters without also securing at least a larger percentage of Hispanic supporters. But I'm still unclear how that makes the ‘Gang of Eight" immigration reform debacle worth my support. Because I think a better question to ask might be, why is it that any ‘new’ legislation is seen as being needed in the first place? Why can't we simply go back to simply enforcing those laws that we already have on the books? Wouldn't that make a whole lot more sense, and, be quite a bit cheaper as well? This really isn't rocket science. Is it?
Anyway, in a recent op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Rove contends that even if the GOP were to win for itself a Reagan-type landslide among whites that would still not secure a victory, since whites now represent a significantly smaller share of U.S. electorate than they did back in 1984. "The upshot is that if Republicans hope to win the presidency in 2016, they need to do better with both white and Hispanic voters," he wrote. Ok, the fact is that while I don't argue with Mr. Rove's point here, but I do take exception to what he recommends that we now go about doing. That, I guess, we just go ahead and pass anything no matter how screwed up it is just to demonstrate to Hispanics that we feel their pain. How transparent would that look? Especially to Hispanics!
A GOP victory, or so Mr. Rove claims, would require a higher turnout of white voters, similar to the 2008 election; a 1 percent increase in the party's share of the white vote; and a "somewhat better" performance among Latinos, or roughly 35 percent. In 2012, our Republican nominee, Mitt Romney, got just 27 percent of the Hispanic vote. Rove said, "If the GOP leaves nonwhite voters to the Democrats, then its margins in safe congressional districts and red states will dwindle — not overnight, but over years and decades." Ok then, so where's the need for us rush headlong into bad immigration reform? And why is the only solution to the immigration 'problem', a 1000 page piece of legislation that is really nothing more than an ill-conceived, knee-jerk reaction?
Rove says that while GOP support for immigration reform would be a winning issue among Hispanics, Republicans also need compelling messages on the other top issues of the day. But in order for these 'compelling messages', to which Rove refers to, actually have any effect, you would first have the difficult, if not impossible, task of trying to convince Hispanics, and blacks, to understand that serious actions are now necessary if we are to successfully prevent ‘our’ country from going over the cliff. And personally, I just don't think that it matters all that much to them one way or the other if the country implodes or not, as long as they keep getting their checks, even if it's right up to the bitter end. Because that's really all that matters most to many of these people anyway.
So I guess, according to Rove, I'm simply expected to go along with this "Gang of Eight" monstrosity regardless of the fact that it is nothing more than an act blatant pandering. Sorry, but it just wouldn't be prudent to go along with what is essentially nothing more than an attempt to push through what is essentially, amnesty. Because, besides being so seriously flawed in so many obvious ways, being far too complicated and the fact that it does absolutely nothing to fix the growing problem of illegal immigration, it's still claimed to be just what we need to fix our current, and very broken, immigration system. If, as so many are saying, that reform is needed, why can't we sit down, and rationally discuss, like adults, what actually needs to be done and do it incrementally.
"Rarely does a political party overcome its challenges by improving just one thing. Republicans must do two things: turn out more white voters and improve their performance among Hispanics, African-Americans and Asian-Americans," Rove wrote. "The GOP has done both in every winning presidential campaign," he said. "The party of Lincoln, to win, must continue to do both." Ok, but what does that mean exactly, by saying that we must continue to do both. What all groups must first have in common is a desire to save the country, no matter what it takes. A task that gets much more difficult with practically each passing day. And yet, I fail to see any real sense of urgency coming out of the various minority communities, where it's seen as being more as a joke.
Look, I’ve argued this point until I'm practically blue in the face. I'm always told how it is that Hispanics, because of their more conservative values, are actually a natural fit for the Republican Party. Well if that were true, which I doubt, wouldn't you think that there would be a natural desire for them to affiliate with the Republican Party without much of anything ‘extra’ needing to be done to ‘entice them? Why not simply articulate how we, as conservatives, need to band together in an effort to address the growing problems that we now face us as a nation? And either they share our concern and our desire to come up with what are real solutions designed to protect their children's futures, or they don't. And if they don't, then I don't think that there’s a 'compelling message' that exists.
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