Arizona Ice Tea

The blowback against the Arizona immigration law has been intense. Latino groups in Arizona report that voter registration this year--a year after a presidential election--has increased by 300% because of fears about this legislation. Latino groups countrywide actually mobilized at least a month prior to Gov. Brewer signing the law. The memos going out are explicit about who the enemies are: the Republican Party, the teabaggers, and the militia movement. Also explicit is a warning that The Police are Not your Enemies. Activist groups quote several sheriffs departments around Arizona saying they want nothing to do with the law. What's interesting is that this explosion in voter registration is happening across the states with heavy Latino populations--California, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada and Texas. The key here is the get out the vote campiagn because Latinos have a high percentage of registered voters but lackluster voting records.

Just think where this puts the Republican Party. When it had George W. as Governor of Texas, Jeb Bush as Governor of Florida and a pro-immigration reform Senator in John McCain, it stood to make permanent inroads into this community. Republicans were gaining between 35%-40% of the Latino vote because they saw Latinos as "value voters" and small business-types. When immigration reform failed during the George W. Bush administration, it was a strategic blow to the Republican strategy. The McCain-Kennedy bill was supported by the Bush White House but was killed by the conservative base in collusion with Blue Dog Democrats. That's why you saw Dick Armey in his role as ring-leader of the teaparty people make clear his part of that movement was not anti-immigrant. However, nativist flame-thrower Tom Tancredo was rapidly seen as one of the most popular speakers at both CPAC and the various teaparty events.

Fast forward to the Republican behavior against Judge Sonya Sotomayor--which sent a clear message to the Latino community. Remember she had been nominated to the bench under Father George Bush. Now, she's unacceptable?

Only moments ago, Lindsey Graham again blasted the Democrats for pushing immigration reform prior to his climate change bill. He used the usual Republican talking points about any Obama-inspired legislation. In sum, this is just phony immigration reform. But "Butters" is under attack from the base at home in South Carolina for going squishy on immigration reform because he's being blackmailed for being gay. Also, he was the only Republican on the judicial committee who voted for Sotomayor's nomination to make it to the floor. So, the average Latino knows where the wind is going in the Republican party.

Then look what happened to the other amigo--John McCain who now supports the Arizona bill because illegals are deliberately causing car accidents. No longer the champion of the immigrant because he's being pressed from the right by J.D. Hayworth. So where do you turn to?

The Republican reaction to the bill is mixed. Charles Krauthammer says that it will lead to too many civil rights violations. Andrew Napolitano, the Fox faux constitutional lawyer, says it will bankrupt Arizona because of all the lawsuits. Mike Huckabee says that there is no "typically-looking America". But Mitch McConnell simply says he hasn't read the bill. Remember Obama has already condemned it. Saxbe Chambliss from Georgia, the man who is supposed to save America from socialism, says "If the people want it, then it's OK." Sarah Palin didn't comment on the bills' contents but said that Governor Brewer is courageous for signing it and delivering a strong blow for states' rights. And we have already seen Bill Kristol's statement. So I'm really going to be comfortable putting my rights in these guys hands.

We may see the direct effects of the Arizona law in this year's races in Texas and California. California under Gov. Wilson once passed a restrictive Proposition on immigrants, which the Hispanic community still remembers. The other race where states' rights are invoked is the Governors' race in Texas with Rick "secessionist" Perry. As hard as it is to be believed, the Texas Republican party has moved way farther right than the days of George W. In fact,George W. attacked the states' righters in his party as too far gone. So, expect some effort by the Democrats and Mike White to get out the Latino vote. Before Arizona, this would have been an iffy and a wait-and-see proposition. Now it's certainty.

People in California can cheer today because they have a new citizen--Mitt Romney. After selling his 14 homes in 2009 to avoid any McCain type criticisms, he moved to New Hampshire to establish a base for his 2012 campaign. Now he's taken up residence in La Jolla to cheer on his former Bains partner Meg Whitman for Governor. Just a hunch--if Meg's Achilles Heel is offshore bank accounts, might not the same be true of Mr. Magic Underpants? We saw this week a strange piece in Huffington Post on Mike Bloomberg's foundation having its assets in the Cayman Islands. Why a foundation needs offshore accounts, when they're not taxed, escapes me. But I think any of these mega-rich candidates do the same thing because it's second nature to their class. I think knowledge of this in the United States results in political suicide.

California just released its new voter registration list today. The total number of voters has increased. But more importantly, party affiliation has changed. Democrats picked up a few more clicks and stand at 44.6% of registered voters and Republicans dropped 4% points to 30.8%. If you throw in the number of Republican-leaning teabaggers who say they are not going to vote, Republicans even with the big money campaigns of Whitman and Hewlett-Packard lady have a tough row to hoe.

CREW released its 13 worst Governors in America. The only Democrats this year are New York's Patterson and New Mexico's Richardson. On the Republican side, there are some presidential aspirants--Bobby Jindal and Haley Barbour.

To save the day, former New York Governor George Pataki says he may run for President in 2012. Funny, he doesn't look American.

President Obama did have his meeting with Rev. Billy Graham. He becomes the first President ever to visit the Graham homestead in North Carolina. Unfortunately, Franklin was there and like a good ambulance chaser he button-holed the President and told him that the Pentagon was trying to keep religion out of the armed forces. The President said he would look into it and probably screamed, "Get me out of here." Although Franklin did compliment the President's efforts to save the National Day of Prayer. I guess the Grahams live in the "gay capital of North Carolina."

The President then flew on to Beckley, West Virginia to speak at the memorial service of the dead miners. I wished he had commented on the mine owner's threat to fire any miner who attended his colleagues' funeral or the fact he contributed over $1 million to the teabaggers.

So I thought I would take the political temperature of my extended family to see how the Republicans are making out for the mid-term. In 2008, we had 14 registered voters, only 2 of which were Democrats; the rest Republicans. Now we have 15 with the party lineup being 12 Republicans, 2 Democrats and 1 anarchist. In 2008, before the Palin nomination as Vice President, it was 7 McCain/ 7 Obama. Once she was nominated, it ended up 12 Obama, 2McCain. So now that Obama hasn't brought peace to the world, balanced the budget, closed Gitmo and has created 1 million jobs per month, how's it look for the Republicans? Well, not so great. There may be 4 votes (tops) for Republican congressional candidates out of 15 votes. I expect only 10 will actually vote. So what you're looking at are historic Republicans who are just fading away. I would expect my 2009 party alignment is actually quite different than 2008. Of the 12 historic Republicans, I expect 6 now call themselves independent, and only 4 I know definitely say they are still Republicans.

You can guess from this blog why many of the family have abandoned the Republican Party. The lawyers in the family because of the extreme right nature of GOP court choices; the women because of the rabid anti-choice platform; and the majority of others because of the embrace of the Religious Right. Curiously, for many who actually benefited from the Bush tax cuts for the rich, this doesn't encourage them to overcome their disdain for the other aspects of GOP policy. Only two family remembers actually still believe the GOP is stronger on defense. It's important to underline that Republican voting in the family sometimes dates back to the Civil War. So the deterioration of party identification is actually a cultural phenomenon which mirrors the collapse of the GOP in the Northeast and Midwest. It also means that the party is losing educated, suburban professionals, one of the key parts of its base. The only family members certain to remain is a birther "Christianist"and a pro-life Catholic male. This isn't to say that the Democrats will pick up members but the current lean in the family is toward Democratic candidates. From all my conversations, George W. Bush's approval rating is less than 20%, Cheney's is sub-zero, while Obama's is way above 50.

So that accounts for my own bias when reading progressive's criticism of Obama. A part of modern America has moved into his camp, which hasn't been recognized. When there is criticism about Obama's "bipartisan" rhetoric, what seems to be missing is that he is addressing the growing number of independent , former Republicans and he's trying to keep them from going back.