Republicans to Recalibrate Their Immigration Policy? (hahahahahahahahaha)

America, America, God shed His grace on thee!

I choose pictures to run with my opinion pieces (What is it I write exactly?) that I hope are representative of the topic. In this case, a snarky caption is meant to catch the irony -- or the emotion -- of a particular set of people engaged in a particular action. In this case, I'm showing a group of white individuals stopping the federal government from moving children from overcrowded immigrant processing centers to less crowded ones.

Fact: The children will end up in some processing center or another without being summarily expelled from the country. So, the protest we see above amounts to just so much hate-inspired froth. Unpleasant though it might be, the reality is that it's ineffective, beyond perpetrating a belief system, one that many of us truly hope amounts to a death rattle, a twitch of the corpse, if you will, of white America's racist xenophobia.

That belief system is Republican-sponsored "We-ism" or "Me-ism" (We're the real America, WE DON'T WANT YOU!!). In other words, conservative white Christians hate brown children, especially if they're trying to get into the Real America of conservative white Christians.

Or maybe all the people in the photo are Obama supporters, you know, bleeding-heart liberals.

Not likely, or am I missing something?

Not likely. So when I read a NYTimes article stressing that the GOP are treading a fine line and if they're not going to lose Hispanic voters, they might want to, I don't know, try to not appear like the most hate-filled, xenophobic dicks imaginable. Oops, too late. But oh, they must try:

Today, as a wave of unaccompanied minors fleeing Central America poses a new crisis for Congress and the White House, Republicans are struggling to calibrate a response that is both tough and humane, mindful of the need to reconcile their freighted history with Hispanic voters and the passions of a conservative base that sees any easing of immigration rules as heresy.

Mmmkay. Let's see, what would a tough and humane way to deal with these children be that would make the Hispanics more likely to vote for white conservatives? I know: Let's give them all teddy bears before deporting them? Apparently that's Glenn Beck's approach. However:

As Breitbart News noted, "Beck did acknowledge that not everyone who is unlawfully entering the country, though, is an innocent child," and "said he did not mean to say that conservatives who oppose his efforts are not compassionate or good-hearted." 

Beck has delivered a monologue subtitled in Spanish urging parents not to send their kids to America and demanded that the children be sent back home. He said it was his hope that the illegal immigrant children ultimately return to their countries and think the Americans they met were "amazing." Beck hoped that the children would decide to make something of themselves in their home countries and try to come to America the right way in the future.

Thanks for clearing that up, Glenn. First, give them teddy bears, then demand they be sent home immediately but urge them of course to make something of themselves before returning to the great, great, great America of their dreams, the "right way."

I get it. The kids deserve to be here the "right way," but for now, get the fuck out. Calibrate that, Republicans.

These patriotic Americans are talking about...

...these children.

We understand, or should, the plight of these refugees. (They are, in fact, refugees.) Beyond the petty, fear-mongering, hate-filled politics of it, the GOP could act like humans if they cared to. Fat chance.

Say what you will, shills for the Republican Party. There will be no calibration. Just weird-ass braying. Yep, I hear it here, there, Murieta, and everywhere. Good on ya, GOP. You make America proud.