Those on the far right of the immigration issue have lived on exaggeration and wild, unsubstantiated claims. The readers on this site who twist the need for a manageable and enforceable guest worker program into cries of amnesty and voting rights for immigrants are the classic example of a lack of any good argument being covered up by hysterics. The country is fed up with the status quo and wants the immigrants to come forward, be checked and identified and given tamper proof IDs so we can enforce the laws, boot the criminals and hold employers accountable for not checking for those pesky tamper proof IDs. And the folks barring the gate to these needed changes (especially the booting of criminal immigrants) are the same folks who flaunt stories of violent crimes by immigrants (legal and otherwise) as the reason we cannot make the changes to get rid of the bad apples.

President Bush knows this hyperventilating minority has become incoherent due to their frustration and anger at being marginalized. The more hype they pile on the already piled up rhetoric further alienates the immigration hard liners from the broader group of Americans who, by 2-1 or higher, back the guest worker program as a pragmatic (if not perfect) solution. The best we will see in a decade if it fails again. So it is no surprise Bush (and many of us) are going through a Sister Soldjah moment to distance ourselves from the useless and anti-productive exaggerations coming from the hard liners in order to win some sanity and progress – finally – on this issue:

“If you want to scare the American people, what you say is the bill’s an amnesty bill,” Mr. Bush said at a training center for customs protection agents and other federal agents here in southeastern Georgia. “That’s empty political rhetoric trying to frighten our citizens.”

It was some of Mr. Bush’s toughest language as he started an intensified effort to build support for the compromise bill in the Senate.

Tough but accurate. The hardliners find any option for illegals to pay restitution and get legal work status “amnesty”. They have taken a legitimate concern about giving illegal immigrants immediate citizenship and totally pollluted it with wild fantasies and over the top exaggerations. And to what end? To kill off change. It is long past time we let the immigration-hypochondriacs stew on some real changes – since they fear change over everything else. They wring their hands whether we do something or not. So let’s do something!

Their concerns are based primarily on science fiction built upon wild extrapolations while assuming no good whatsoever can come of any solution. Basically they are the purveyors of the pathological example – which has as much chance of coming true as man made Global Warming. The interesting thing has been the more they post and voice their wild claims the less credible I (and many others I suspect) find them, and the easier it is to move past them and build new alliances. Like most doomed movements, sometimes the best path to victory is to let them speak and share their unique views. They are their own worst enemy – we simply just need to point out the wild exaggerations and unserious claims. Not to mention the fact what they say they want addressed cannot be addressed because they are blocking progress. Want immigrant criminals to get booted? Pass the Bill. Otherwise we are stuck right were we are now – unable to enforce the laws because current laws don’t work the way people think they do.

Much of the Guest Worker program will work and will produce results. Many peolpe will be targeted for deportation based on their criminal past. Those that stay know they must behave and know they are not hidden from the system since they had to have been processed to stay. But these needed changes are irrelevant to the hardliners. In their realities their is no hope no matter what we do. Which is why it is time to set them aside and get something accomplished.