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What a boob. I read the transcript of Bush's speech on immigration, and found it highly entertaining. The highlights: border control through use of the national guard and hi-tech, a guest worker program, a national id card, more prisons for illegals, a limited amnesty, with citizenship dependent on the ability to learn english. Bush is attempting to thread the needle, hoping that a bunch of U.S. troops on the border are going to appease the nativist right, while at the same time the amnesty and guest worker system keeps Latinos from turning on the Republican party.

My guess? Instead he'll alienate both sides. Here's his problem - big business wants slave labor, Latinos want to given a chance and not treated like lepers, and the white xenophobes want all the brown people thrown out of the country. The only group satisfied with Bush's proposal is going to be business, which gets its guest workers. Unfortunately for Bush, business doesn't control that many votes - which is why the Republicans made their alliance with nationalists, libertarians, and the religious right in the first place.

Let me spend just a minute on the substance of Bush's proposals

1) Border control. The use of the national guard is a gesture - no more than that. 6,000 more people, even with great gizmos, aren't going to stop a million people. It's also a stopgap for an expanded border control - a border control Bush has tried to cut, by the way. And may I ask where these extra troops are going to come from? Are we pulling out of Iraq and I just wasn't told? Because last time I checked all our troops were bogged down in garrison duty a half a world away.

2) National id cards. Fine George, if you can make it work. Because God knows you can't get fake id's in this country. No market or infrastructure for that, uh-uh. And I can imagine that the right-wing fringe will go nuts with all the "mark of the beast" stuff, while the libertarians will have visions of a police state.

3) Guest workers. This is why I am against the Senate compromise. Why should we have guest workers again? So big corporations can continue to exploit a captive labor force. Right, I forgot. And the nativists are completely against this proposal.

4) More prisons for illegals. I agree that we should end catch and release, but do you have any idea how expensive prisons are? Where is the money going to come from?

5) Limited amnesty. So you're going to tell people not to come and then tell them that if they do, they'll be fine? How does this reduce the incentive to migrate?

6) Mandatory English. I suppose this means that George Bush loses his citizenship. (thanks for the line, BH!). But seriously, I am all for every American being able to speak the same language fluently. But to require that this be the case to be eligible for citizenship? That's a little extreme, people.

So as you can see, this plan is a bizarre hodge-podge of ideas that are either contradictory, unworkable, or both. Mysteriously absent from Bush's laundry list is any significant sanction on employers - you know, the one's hiring the illegals. I am very aware of the practical problems of punishing companies that hire illegals - particularly that it might lead to employment discrimination against illegals - but I fail to see how the supply of immigrants is going to fall without affecting the demand. And where is the plan to revive the Mexican economy so that immigration is less necessary?

Sorry guys - this isn't a plan. This is a political tactic - and a huge blunder at that. As I suspected, the Republicans are going to reach towards their nativist base during the mid-terms, hoping that anti-immigrant sentiment will help them preserve control of Congress. Which will hand the Latino vote to Democrats for a generation. Thanks guys. We really appreciate it.