Steve Parkhurst was on the radio today to talk about the New Hampshire primaries and many other topics. Please take a listen and let us know what you think.
Tag: marco rubio
Immigration Reform Must Mean Immigration Security
By Joe Gruters
The Boston bombings have shown again the critical security issues involved with our immigration policy, and the importance of knowing who is visiting our country and where they are.
This means starting with secure borders and enacting e-verify, and the fact is that our borders are not secure right now. People illegally cross back and forth by the millions. That is a blatant security problem that also is creating enormous financial burdens on Americans and visitors who are here legally, abiding by American laws and paying into the system.
It is both dangerous and it is unfair.
So we have great respect for Sen. Marco Rubio and what he is trying to accomplish with immigration reform. It clearly needs reforming. And he should get tremendous kudos for taking on such a politically dicey issue — one that is dividing his own party. He is showing leadership from the front, unlike the current White House occupant.
However, having said that, the bill remains flawed. Despite Sen. Rubio’s defenses of the triggers, when boiled down it appears to be amnesty-first. The most realistic future based on the duplicity of the last time we went through immigration “reform” in the 1980s is that Democrats will find a way to avoid the border security.
Rich Lowry, editor of National Review, writes that the bill calls for “an enforcement plan on paper and a commission to be named later.” A giant loophole.
“Under the bill, no additional enforcement has to take place before undocumented immigrants get legalized. The secretary of the Department of Homeland Security merely has to come up with a strategy for enforcement and notify Congress that it has commenced. It doesn’t matter if it is a good, bad, or indifferent plan, so long as it is a plan. Then, an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants get legal status.”
Now that legal status is not citizenship. And according to the bill right now, such citizenship would still require going through hoops. It’s not the blanket from the 1980s. But unfortunately, it does not take a prophet to predict how the Democrats will act. Sequestration has proven they are more interesting in winning than governing in the best interests of the American people.
Once the people here illegally are made to be here legally with the wave of a pen, Democrats will immediately begin to push to make them citizens. The Gang of Eight proposal is only legislation. It can be changed, modified or overturned.
So Democrats will pull at emotions to argue that we’ve got to allow these legal residents to have all the benefits available if they are paying into the system. And then they will argue that this country was built on a revolt against taxation without representation and that this will leave the people here legally in the position of paying taxes but not being able to vote — which will resonate with a lot of people. Therefore they must become citizens.
And we still won’t have border security.
Again.
There is only one chance with leverage on Democrats primarily seeking millions more Democrat voters. Any immigration reform must be based in factual reality, not the pieties of political correctness, and not in crass future political gains regardless of the consequences to the nation.
If it cannot be done with the security of the American people in mind first — and that means fully guarded borders — then it should not be done at all. As bad as the current situation is, it is better than any solution that involves giving legal status to the current crop of people here illegally before the borders are actually, physically secured.
Thanks for being informed and engaged.
Lowry: Where Is Today’s Jack Kemp?
Rich Lowry has written an important column at National Review Online. He covers the RNC and asks a question we have been asking here: Where is today’s Jack Kemp?
Here are the parts you need to know:
The harsh assessment of the RNC “autopsy” committee would be that it talked to 2,600 people, yet one of its top proposals is reviving a minority inclusion council from the 1990s. It takes months of research to come up with this stuff?
But that would be too harsh. The autopsy is a good-faith effort to stare the Republican predicament straight in the face.
The RNC autopsy has stirred up another round in an intraparty debate that is yeasty and entertaining, and will surely prove largely irrelevant to the Republican future.
One facet of that ongoing debate is the fight between the grassroots and the establishment over Senate primaries, which has been raging for months and got more fuel when speakers at the annual conservative gathering, the Conservative Political Action Conference, savaged the Republican consultant class. Rarely has so much heat been generated with so little light.
Consider Ted Cruz of Texas, whose smarts and fearlessness are making him the most dangerous man in the U.S. Senate. He proves that you can be anti-establishment — he ran a grassroots insurgency in his Republican primary — and yet talented and electable.
And so much depends on substance. No “rebranding” will make a difference if Republican policy is not relevant to people’s lives. What the party desperately needs more than different marketing or new consultants are a few Jack Kemps, political entrepreneurs willing to ignore orthodoxies and evangelize for new ideas.
Kemp did his most important work as a backbencher in the House. Where is his equivalent today? Two possible Republican contenders in 2016 have demonstrated some of his entrepreneurial spirit. No committee ever would have come up with the idea for Rand Paul’s filibuster. It showed gumption and creativity, and it caught people’s imagination. But it was in a cause — preventing drone attacks on U.S. citizens — that is not pertinent to the everyday life of anyone not on the run in Yemen.
For his part, Rubio has begun to talk about college affordability, an issue that should be part of a new conservative agenda aimed at concrete middle-class concerns. All the action, though, is around Rubio’s other cause of comprehensive immigration reform.
The Republican party can study itself to death, but without some Jack Kemps, it will remain in its current stasis for the duration.
This is another reminder that there is a Jack Kemp Project forthcoming from us here at GPH Consulting. Be sure you’re on the list to be notified first about what’s going on.
Standing For What We Believe In!
By Joe Gruters
Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster Wednesday was more than political theater. Sure, it undoubtedly gave his political ambitions a boost. But that was not the driving factor behind it, nor should be for any Republicans.
In those 13 hours of standing on the Senate floor and controlling his bodily needs, Paul represented what so many conservatives are yearning for: someone who will stand up for what he believes in.
And he presented in force an answer to the interminably successful Obama media spin: An articulate, principled conservative who would not back down, or moderate, or capitulate, speaking directly to the American people beyond the media filter. You don’t have to agree with all of Sen. Paul’s views to appreciate the honest dedication he holds to his core beliefs and the brilliance of the decision.
It wasn’t the specific issue so much — although wanting to know the administration’s views on the constitutionality of targeting Americans on American soil who do not pose an imminent threat is worthy. Very worthy, if we still treasure our freedoms.
And it wasn’t even so much that finally conservatives had a man standing up to President Obama, who becomes more imperial in his actions every day. We have yearned for Congressional Republicans to get a spine and Paul displayed his. And his spirited defense rallied others, including Sens. Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, John Thune and many others.
It is no small irony that Sens. John McCain and Lindsay Graham were at the same time at a posh D.C. restaurant enjoying a luxurious dinner with Obama, who had just closed the White House to tours to save few bucks and blame Republicans. Those methods of schmoozing where everyone gets a little something for their political gain just don’t work for the good of the country anymore — if they ever did.
And that may have been the primary accomplishment of Paul’s filibuster: He stood athwart the dangerous trail of history we are traveling and shouted, “Halt!”
He has as a core belief in the supremacy of the U.S. Constitution in governing and restraining the actions of the federal government. That is a core of conservatism and the Republican Party that sets us apart from liberal progressives and the Democrat Party. We stand on the founding principles spelled out in the Constitution. We believe that document has done more than any other (outside the Bible) to free men and keep them free.
It instituted free speech, freedom of religion and freedom to bear arms — freedoms never found in one place before in history. It instituted the incredible hope and prosperity that drew millions and millions of immigrants from every country in the world.
American liberals dismiss the Constitution and the religious underpinnings of the men who wrote it. Obama has been a leader in doing that. And both the freedom and the prosperities are ebbing backwards. Today’s announcement that more than 89 million Americans are not working is the latest evidence.
Obama promised fundamental change in America and has been delivering. Paul stood up and shouted, “Halt!” against this advance of totalitarian-leaning liberals.
And finally, people began to listen.
Conservatism is always a winner with the American people. But it needs to be forcefully defended. That’s what happened Wednesday.
Thanks for being informed and engaged.
Leftwing Media Assault On Marco Rubio Well Underway
I saw something interesting today in the San Antonio Express-News. You can see for yourself below, the “letter to the editor” section features a picture of US Senator Marco Rubio. That picture refers to the letter “Unbalanced” by Frank H. Wians Jr., which begins at the bottom left in the picture.
There are several items in play here. First, sympathizer Bruce Davidson had an op-ed (Castro faces local challenges along with stardom) published on February 17 on the front page of the San Antonio Express-News’ Opinion page. On page 3 in the same issue, Leftist Maria Anglin, also a sympathizer, wrote an op-ed (The peril of the pedestal) knocking Senator Rubio for “the ascent of the earnest young senator from Florida”. And, because she focused her attack on Senator Rubio, I am going to focus today on Maria and her column.
The delusion of Maria Anglin really becomes more evident here:
Time magazine called him “The Republican Savior.” Karl Rove has called him “the best communicator since Ronald Reagan.” And when Rubio was picked to deliver the State of the Union rebuttal, House Speaker John Boehner said he carries the GOP banner of freedom, opportunity and prosperity in a way few others can.
Wow.
Apparently Maria knows nothing about Rubio or his family story. I’m really not sure why she is confused by any of this. Actually, I do understand. It has to do with the R after his name. Senator Rubio is not one of the fellow travelers like Maria, and therefore, he is to be vilified, destroyed and left on the ash heap. And this is ok since Rubio does have that R after his name. If he had a D after his name, we would be able to call Maria a racist and other clever code words approved by the Left.
Maria continues:
Rubio did say that there is only one savior, and that he isn’t it. But, so far, there’s no word about how close he thinks he can come to Dutch or Superman.
That my friends, that may be one of the dumbest sentences ever put on paper. Fortunately, Rubio is not trying to be Dutch or Superman, he is trying to be Senator Marco Rubio, Republican Senator from Florida.
Maria then had to get in some shots on Sarah Palin, for some reason (actually, that reason is simply to bash all Republicans, that’s why Maria writes and why she is published):
Remember Sarah Palin? Once she was the pistol from Alaska, a no-nonsense moose-skinning hockey mom who finally seemed to understand the lives of the average American Republican.
She wasn’t a political monster, but she had enough exposure to run alongside a presidential candidate with an iffy ticker. Today, she’s little more than a fringe figure who can be counted on to deliver regrettable tweets.
Finally, to really get to the point, besides the fact that Marco Rubio is indeed of Cuban descent, and a Republican, Maria tries to point our side in another direction:
Still, if it’s ever going to happen, it needs to get started. So why not Rubio? Then again, why not Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal? He, too, seems to have the same fire, although he reads a little more, well, angry.
Now I’m really starting to think that Marco Rubio might just be the right guy, at the right time. When our candidates start to get shredded, and then more “viable” or alternative candidates are offered up from the Left, you know they are just trying to throw us off. I am inclined not to be interested in advice from the Left.
We all know that if Thursday at 9pm came around and Governor Jindal was the Republican nominee, by 9:20pm Maria and the fellow Left leaning “journalists” would have their stories ready to print about Jindal’s being “too angry” and his lack of experience (Louisiana is a little state, right?). This is a game to these sociopaths. A game I don’t intend to play, and hopefully the lessons of 2008 and 2012 have helped teach our side to stop playing the game on the Left’s turf, and by their rules. For example, look no further than our sides willingness to allow Leftists from ABC, CNN, CNBC, Politico or MSNBC to ask questions of our candidates during Presidential primary debates. That has to stop.
We obviously have a long way to go to get to 2016 and that nominating process. I am not interested in the opinions of those on the Left as to who we should nominate. They will not be fair, they will not be balanced, we know this going in. These articles point to that disparity in fairness and accuracy. Rarely will one shill newspaper show its hand all in one issue, but it happened on February 17; praise the one, denigrate the other.
– – –
I’m not going to delve into Bruce Davidson’s attempts to sympathize with, and begin to make excuses for, Julian Castro. There will be plenty more on that, later. But as Mr. Wians points out in his letter above, the Express-News is one newspaper not hiding its Leftwing tilt very well.
Kondracke: “Kempism” Beginning To Emerge
Morton Kondracke spoke last week in Los Angeles at Occidental College at the first Kemp Scholar lecture, a new program created at the college from which Jack Kemp graduated. We have posted the thoughts of Mr. Kondracke previously, as he has become a bit of an expert on Jack Kemp in his writing a much overdue biography.
Last week’s Kondracke visit is reported here. The best part of the report comes when Kondracke got into specifics about Jack Kemp Conservatism, which he dubbed “Kempism”:
“Jack was the first and chief advocate for a new idea called supply-side economics,” Kondracke said. “He’s the one who sold Reagan on what became Reaganomics.” His new biography will argue that Reagan and Kemp, acting in concert on both domestic and international policy, won the Cold War. The book’s working title, he said, is Jack Kemp: the Quarterback Who Changed the World.
While Kemp was a principled conservative, “he also was an idealist, passionately dedicated to the well-being of all Americans, regardless of race or gender or income,” Kondracke said. “He thought that ideas could change the world, and he fought his battles on that level, even though that cost him during his political campaigns.”
Were he alive today, Kemp would not write off 47 percent of the electorate, as Mitt Romney did during last year’s presidential election, he said. Kemp opposed Proposition 187, the 1994 California initiative aimed at undocumented workers, and believed supply-side incentives could have a powerful positive effect on communities of color.
“As Newt Gingrich once said, Jack has showered with more African-Americans than most Republicans have ever met,” Kondracke said. “Jack honestly believed that the GOP could once again be the party of Lincoln, that if the economy provided jobs that extended into the ghetto, African-Americans would vote Republican.”
In the wake of Romney’s defeat, Kondracke added, “We have seen the beginnings of the emergence of ‘Kempism’” from such figures as Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin (who counted Kemp as a mentor), Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, and Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida. “What the Republican Party needs is what Jack provided—a conservative message that would appeal to average, ordinary citizens.”
It’s clear that Jack Kemp Conservatism is the definitive remedy for what ails the Republican party today; a solid message that appeals to and benefits every American.
Stay tuned to our efforts, whether here on the blog, via Twitter or via our Jack Kemp project email newsletter. We have some very interesting things in the works and the best way to hear about them will be via one of those three methods. We have made recent additions to the GPH Consulting team and together there will be new things you have not seen from a political consulting firm before.
Newt Gingrich On SOTU And Marco Rubio’s Defining Response
Newt Gingrich has written about Tuesday’s State Of The Union address. The closing portion of the column is worth posting here:
Last night was not a very encouraging evening if you are looking for a realistic, practical approach to America’s problems from President Obama.
The response by Senator Marco Rubio, on the other hand, was a breath of fresh air. He spoke to common sense and basic American values.
After you have listed all the new government programs, new bureaucracies and new taxes outlined by President Obama, take a careful look at the speech by Senator Rubio for a real contrast in bringing to bear the established principles that for over 200 years have made America the most successful, safest and freest country in the world.
I, for one, am delighted Senator Rubio so ably communicated our values, our principles and our hopes to the Latino Community. This is clearly an area where we Republicans must improve: If Governor Romney had received just 36% of the Latino vote, he would have gotten more votes than President Obama.
There is no reason conservatives need to be embarrassed or shy about reaching out to every American of every ethnic background and offering them a better future based on solid conservative values. That is exactly what Senator Marco Rubio did last night, and Republicans should be proud.
Senator Rubio has positioned himself well with his response, as is evidenced by the reactions on the Left over the last 24 hours. Rubio’s Spanish version of his response has gone a long way toward reaching beyond the traditional Republican base, and if you needed more proof that it is working, watch the lemmings on Left (including the media) try to slander and demean the Senator.
Rubio Delivers Republican Response, Twice
Marco Rubio, United States Senator from Florida, pulled off quite a feat tonight. He offered the Republican rebuttal to President Obama’s State Of The Union address. That seems ordinary enough, but Senator Rubio went a step further and delivered the speech, once in English and once in Spanish. Videos of both speeches are posted below.
English:
Spanish:
If you watched either video, you likely noticed the moment where Senator Rubio reached for a drink of water. It was a very human moment, and Senator Rubio made the most of it after he spoke, take a look at this tweet and picture:
#GOPResponse #SOTU #gop #tcot twitter.com/marcorubio/sta…
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) February 13, 2013
Artemio Muniz on The Mark McCaig Show
Artemio Temo Muniz was recently interviewed on The Mark McCaig Show, in Houston on KNTH AM1070. Temo and Mark talked about a whole range of topics including Hispanic outreach, Marco Rubio, Jack Kemp Conservatism, demographics and the recent Senate District 6 election in Houston. Listen to the interview and feel free to share it with others.
What are your thoughts? Do you have the magic solution to immigration and the changing demographics of America? Share them with us here, or Tweet us.
Gingrich: An Immigration Debate Based On Reality
Today, Newt Gingrich published this very good op-ed on the immigration debate. I felt this was worth sharing in its entirety because of its depth.
By Newt Gingrich
Campaigning for president last year included the opportunity to participate in a number of memorable televised debates.
As I think about what the Republican Party must do to rebuild, a particular set of exchanges from these debates stick out as a lesson.
We, the candidates, were asked repeatedly what we would do with the 12 million illegal immigrants currently in the United States, “many of whom have been in this country a long time.”
I always laid out two critical pieces of any immigration solution: the urgent need to secure the border, and the creation of a guest worker program.
But it was also important to answer the real question with intellectual honesty.
There are 12 million people in this country who have come here illegally. It wasn’t our choice for this to happen, but their presence is a fact. So we must decide: Are we really going to deport all 12 million people, many of whom have deep ties here?
My position was that people who have come here recently, have no ties to this country, should go home. But the-size-fits-all deportation of 12 million people, without regard to their circumstances, would constitute a level of inhumanity the American people would never accept.
As I said in a Florida debate, “We as a nation are not going to walk into some family…and grab a grandmother out and then kick them out.”
In response to this call for discretion and humanity, while at the same time enforcing the law, several other candidates — including our party’s eventual nominee — had repeatedly accused me of amnesty.
At an earlier debate Governor Romney replied to my suggestion by saying, in essence, “Amnesty is a magnet…people respond to incentives. And if you can become a permanent resident of the United States by coming here illegally, you’ll do so.”
The Democratic National Committee actually cut an attack ad against Romney based on this very exchange, which you can see here.
The ad below was produced by the Democratic National Committee
It is difficult to understand how someone running for President of the United States, a country with more than 50 million Hispanic citizens, could fail to acknowledge that the American people should not take grandmothers who have been here 25 years, have deep family and community ties — and forcibly expel them.
When asked in a Florida debate if, in light of his criticism, his own immigration proposal would round up 12 million people and deport them, he replied, “Well, the answer is self-deportation.”
And we wonder why the Republican Party achieved historically low levels of support among Latinos in 2012?
As we study what happened last year, we’ve discovered the data support the intuition that this rhetoric can kill the Republican Party among Latinos.
An August 2011 Univision National Poll in collaboration with the Mellman Group and the Tarrance Group found that only about a third of likely Hispanic voters had an unfavorable impression of Governor Romney. Roughly a fifth had a favorable impression, a quarter weren’t sure, and the rest had never heard of him.
The poll showed that 41 percent of likely Hispanic voters were still persuadable — they were weak Obama supporters, or they were undecided or favored Romney. There was opportunity for Republicans.
An election eve poll of Latino voters found that a year later, only 14 percent thought Governor Romney “truly cares about Latinos.” 56 percent said he “does not care about Latinos,” and 18 percent said he is “hostile toward Latinos.” 66 percent, meanwhile, said President Obama “truly cares.”
When asked about Governor Romney’s statements on immigration, including specifically his claim that illegal immigrants would “self-deport,” 57 percent of Latino voters said it made them less enthusiastic about him. Only 7 percent said it made them more enthusiastic, meaning on that issue he was underwater by 50 points.
He went on to be defeated by wide margins among Latino voters.
In fact, if he had won even 36 percent of them, Governor Romney would be President Romney today.
I do not write this to single out Mitt Romney. He worked hard for a long time and his campaign was up against skilled opponents. But the sad fact is that the Republican Party for too long has failed to communicate to Latino Americans a positive vision for the future. Our slide among Asian Americans has been in the works for a generation.
I write this because as the current immigration debate heats up it is critical for us to recognize that words and attitudes really matter. Understanding what people hear matters. We may not mean to say what people hear we say. After decades in politics this is a lesson I have learned the hard way.
As a party, we simply cannot continue with immigration rhetoric that in 2012 became catastrophic — in large part because it was not grounded in reality.
Senator Marco Rubio has done an important service cutting through some of the baloney with the observation that what we have now is de facto amnesty. It is reality. The 12 million people are here, living and working. Many of them are bound together by the web of human relations — family, friends, neighbors — and the American people will not support mass deportation.
That is the reality — the starting point of the debate about what we, as a country, should do.
This does not mean we as Republicans should give up on our principles, or on the priority of securing the border.
It means we must recognize, as I tried to do in that primary debate, that politics is always an intersection of principles and people.
A party that appears to ignore people won’t get the chance to make the case for its principles — any of them.
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