Republicans May Be Against ALL Working Families But They hate Immigrant Working Families Even More

Yesterday when the Senate was arguing about passing SCHIP again, it wasn't just working families Republicans had declared war on. They had decided to scapegoat Latinos again; well, not just Latinos... all immigrants; but mostly Latinos. The newest excuse for these reactionary scumbags to oppose health insurance for needy children? The Democrats took away the 5-year waiting period for legal immigrants and by easing the paperwork burden, some illegal immigrant child might possibly someday perhaps sneak into the system and get health care. This morning Mitch McConnell tried substituting his own mean-spirited bill for the actual SCHIP bill. He was supported by 31 hard right reactionary Republicans, while all the Democrats plus Republicans Kit Bond, Susan Collins, Chuck Grassley, Orrin Hatch, Dick Lugar, Lisa Murkowski, Olympia Snowe and Arlen Specter voted against his rotten tactic.

The Republicans have given up on trying to reach All Americans and win national elections. Now their only goal is the shore up their demented hate-filled base in the old slave-holding states and the Mormon West. They've given up on winning among Latinos and decided to concentrate on people who don't care about not having dental care and who go to church more than 7 days a week. Looking at data from November's elections explains why reactionaries and racists like Jim DeMint (R-SC), Johnny Isakson (R-GA), David Diapers Vitter (R-LA), Richard Burr (R-NC) and Tom Coburn (R-OK) have told Latinos to go to hell.

• Exit polls from Election Day indicated that President Barack Obama won 67 percent of the Latino vote, and John McCain 32 percent. This compares to estimates of Latino support for George W. Bush in the range of 39 percent or higher in 2004. In 2000, Bush is thought to have received 35 percent of the Latino vote.

• The drop in support among Latinos for Republicans between 2004 and 2008 was part of a broad-based electoral movement away from the GOP, and was hardly specific to that demographic group. McCain received only 57 percent of the white male vote, compared with 62 percent for Bush in 2004, and McCain’s 55 percent of regular churchgoers was significantly lower than Bush’s 61 percent.

• Credible surveys indicate that the major policy concerns of Latinos were no different than the concerns of non-Latinos: The economy and jobs topped the list.

• There is little evidence that immigration policy was an influential factor in Latinos’ choice between the two candidates once basic party predispositions are taken into account.

• McCain’s consistent history of advocating a legalization program for illegal immigrants made no impression on Latino voters.

• McCain lost the Latino vote by a wide margin even in his home state of Arizona, 56 to 41 percent. This was in spite of widespread news coverage of his immigration stance in that state.

The survey and analysis by James Gimpel for the Center For Immigration Studies slices and dices the GOP's dismal (and costly) failure to lure Hispanic voters into their orbit. For one thing, "very few Latinos are migrating into Republican-heavy communities, where they might develop some affinity for the Grand Old Party’s politics." They tend to live in Democratic cities and older Democrat suburbs. Broadcasting a few ads-- even en espanol-- and making an extra campaign stop isn't going to turn around party allegiance. The die is cast: toothless, superstitious rednecks will remain true to Republican racists. Hispanics and other immigrant groups won't.

OK, Republicans DO support certain working families, like John Thain's

In seeking a new head for their shattered and reviled party, Republicans all seem to agree Bush screwed up everything. The problem from there, however, is that some say he was too far right and some say he wasn't far right enough. And the gamut of potential chairs of the RNC runs from the mainstream right to the neo-Nazi extremist right. None are big fans of immigrants, although not all are as dangerous to immigrant families as others. If one of the bizarre Know Nothing extremists, like Katon Dawson (SC) or Chip Saltsman (TN) or Kenneth Blackwell (OH) wins, it will send a strong and clear message to immigrant communities-- and to working families-- that there not only is no place for them in the Republican Party, but that the Republican Party will spearhead efforts to further marginalize them and wreck their aspirations. With the 2010 midterm elections already starting to shape up, Senate elections in Colorado, Florida, New York, Nevada, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Illinois are all likely to be heavily impacted by the extent of Republican xenophobia, racism and how strongly the Know Nothing wing dominates what's left of the party. Vulnerable Republicans across all offices are getting very nervous-- and for good reason.

Example: while Republicans in Florida are fighting among themselves to determine who is the craziest fringe loon most likely to destroy the interests of working families, the strongest Democratic candidate, Dan Gelber, is starting to address the real issues that effect the real lives of real Floridians. So while the nuts in the GOP are arguing among themselves over arcane doctrinal purity and trying to decide if its better to attack President Obama or lay low, Gelber is dealing with nuts and bolts of the state's home insurance catastrophe. After unsuccessfully trying to raise homeowner rates by 50% in Florida, the state's largest private insurer, State Farm, announced yesterday that it would close down all its property insurance business in the state, affecting more than a million homeowners, "another financial setback to a state with one of the nation’s highest foreclosure rates and rising unemployment. It could also increase the burden on a state-created insurance company, which must accept customers if they have nowhere else to go."

With lunatic fringe extremists like Reps. Vern Buchanan and Connie Mack, tying themselves to the obstructionist/Limbaughist wing of the Republican Party that would rather see America fail than Obama succeed, Dan Gelber is working on the insurance policy. Yesterday when the news of State's Farm's announcement broke, he seemed angry and disappointed. "They are taking their profits, packing up and leaving their customers high and dry when folks need coverage the most," he told us. "Not acting like the 'good neighbor' in their commercials, more like the neighbor that kicks your dog and swipes your mower."

The just-released Diageo poll makes it clear GOP obstructionists may be appealing to Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter and their rapidly dwindling audience of imbeciles and racists, but most Americans are not buying into their anti-American treachery.

The Diageo/Hotline Poll of 800 registered voters conducted by FD from January 21-24, 2009, finds that 49% of voters say they approve of the job Democrats in Congress are doing, while only 26% of voters who approve of the job Republicans in Congress are doing.

And, while the 111th Congress has been in session barely three weeks, the Poll finds that the Democratic candidate leads the Republican candidate 46%-22% in a generic 2010 congressional election match-up, with 27% of voters saying they are undecided.

Acting out their childish, obstructionist fantasies is going to make them very popular in some very backward districts in parts of the rural South and Utah, but Republican Senate and House incumbents in states like New Hampshire, North Carolina, Kentucky, Arizona, and Iowa may be in for the shock of their political careers. And GOP challengers in states like Missouri, Illinois, New York, Ohio, Florida and even Kansas are going to dind they're campaign on a ticket that is viewed as part of the problem, not part of the solution.