Bad Vetting

It seems that not only did John McCain hold a private meeting with Latino leaders in Chicago at which he tacked left on immigration (after having tacked right after having tacked left earlier) but that his staff let an Illinois Minutemen leader (who happens to be Hispanic) into the meeting so he could hear everything and get pissed off:

So she went to the meeting, a room full of 150-200 people. "Sure enough," Pulido says, "his mantra at the meeting was comprehensive immigration reform.' And there were cheers and applause whenever he mentioned comprehensive immigration reform."

"Then he said, 'I bet some of you don't know this -- did you know Spanish was spoken in Arizona before English?' And the crowd roared. I was appalled," Pulido said. "He was pandering to these people -- that's what they wanted to hear."

I guess I basically agree with what appears to be McCain's real position on immigration, and I look forward to David Brooks' column on McCain's unprincipled flip-flopping on this subject.

This article available online at:

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2008/06/bad-vetting/48850/