by Patrick Appel
DiA sizes up the politics of tackling immigration in an election year:
[M]aybe introducing an immigration bill in spring 2010 and having it
dominate the headlines in the summer of a mid-term election year would
be great for Democrats. As the Sonia Sotomayor Supreme Court
confirmation battle showed, the overwhelmingly white conservative core
of the Republican Party can be reliably counted on to go absolutely
crazy over anything connected to racial diversity and the fossilised
remains of the issue formerly known as "political correctness". It's
true that immigration reform caused George Bush immense political
trouble in 2006. But the reason why it
caused him trouble was that it caused a far-right revolt among white
conservatives, whose racially tinged invective devastated Republican
Party support among Hispanics. Mr Bush's immigration reform efforts
were excellent politicsfor Democrats.
This article available online at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/daily-dish/archive/2009/08/immigration-reform-in-2010/197644/
