Xenophobia as public policy

Republicans have side stepped issues that would be divisive in their party while cleverly exploiting issues that are divisive in the Democratic party. Now, Bush has plucked the worse possible divisive issue for his party and shoved it forward.

Immigration is especially perilous for the GOP because it is what might be called a "double-edged" wedge issue. It not only pits the party's base against a large and quickly growing pool of potential new Republicans -- 41 million Hispanics -- but also pits two key parts of the existing base against each other. The Wall Street wing of the GOP, which finances the party, wants to keep open the spigot of pliant and cheap Spanish-speaking labor. It finds itself opposed by much of the Main Street wing, which provides millions of crucial primary and general election votes and would like to build a fence along the Mexican border as high as Lou Dobbs' ratings or the pitch of Pat Buchanan's voice. And it's simply impossible for any political party to win if it has to choose between money and votes.

The Hispanic population is growing at the rate of 3% a year. They are too important to the future to be ignored and the Republicans are doing even more: they are alienating them. Bush got an astonishing 40% of the Hispanic vote in 2000. By 2004 his Hispanic vote had shrunk to 28%. The Republicans plans for making inroads into the black vote drowned in Katrina. The future of the party is grim if it looses both groups for long.

My guess is that the Immigration Bill will never make it to Bush's desk. I think the Republican Party's xenophobic base will kill the bill and wound the Republican Party. The question is: how badly will the party hurt itself and for how long.

xen·o·pho·bi·a /ˌzɛnəˈfoʊbiə, ˌzinə-/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[zen-uh-foh-bee-uh, zee-nuh-] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
an unreasonable fear or hatred of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange.