Amnesty Insanity

Michelle Malkin reports on Rush Limbaugh's criticism of President Bush's amnesty program for illegal Mexcan aliens. John Fund piked up on it too and emphasized the point that many in the Republican Party are disturbed by the Bush Administration's tone-deafness on the immigration issue:

Rush has 20 million listeners a week, so if he decides to attack President Bush's plan to regularize immigration flows through a guest-worker program, he could help kill the idea. The president told reporters last week that he plans to make a guest worker plan a "priority," so last Friday he was peppered with questions about it at a private retreat for GOP congressmen at the Greenbrier resort in West Virginia. "Family values do not end at the Rio Grande river," Mr. Bush told the lawmakers, while assuring them his plan was not a backdoor amnesty program. He promised them more details in his State of the Union address on Wednesday.

From this vantage point, it seems clear that the President has a mis-perception of the extent of his political capital. Frankly, he probably does not see this as an issue of capital expenditure but rather an advantage of beginning a lame-duck term.

This President has performed much better than his father when it comes to working the politics of issues in which he believes strongly. That is to his credit. But 20 million Rush listeners, and Republicans in general, are independent thinking enough to stand on principle themselves.

When it comes to getting things done in this country, ultimately the true power belongs to the people, not the best politician. The independent nature of the American people is the heritage we bring to freedom around the world. It is likely to be exercised with flawless precision in regards to immigration reform to the chagrin of those who believe we owe a debt to "Mexican family-values."