Because I like to read things that would make me happy

The GOP begins to implode

President Bush's nationally televised address on immigration Monday night was intended as a grand gesture to revive his collapsing presidency, but instead he has plunged the Republican Party into a political centrifuge that is breaking it down into its raw elements, which are colliding into each other, triggering explosions of unexpected and ever greater magnitude.

The nativist Republican base is at the throat of the business community. The Republican House of Representatives, in the grip of the far right, is at war with the Republican Senate. The evangelical religious right is paralyzed while the Roman Catholic Church has emerged as a mobilizing force behind the mass demonstrations of millions of Hispanic immigrants. Every effort Bush makes to hold a nonexistent Republican center is generating an opposing effect within his party.

I agree with the point that he makes that the natavist pent up fear of the other riled up by Bush after 9/11 is looking for a new swarthy target.

I think a lot of the Malkin types have become bored with the whole "War on Terror" business, which provided them good, strong emotional sustenance for the last four years. But September 11 is now almost five years away. There have been no good "battles" for a long time; we don't even pretend to capture or kill any high-ranking Al Qaeda members any more; and while invocations of "war" will always be good for some blood-rushing excitement, the whole thing seems so distant and abstract at this point. It's just not enough any more.

They're also clearly tired of slogging through the political and ethnic complexities of Iraq. That country just doesn't lend itself to any morally clear good/evil dichotomies. There are no good cartoon villains to hate. Calls for increased "ferocity," less "sensitive" approaches ("bomb some more mosques!"), and less discriminate bombings can generate some temporary enthusiasm -- as it did for a day or so with Shelby Steele's column -- but Iraq is so muddled and ambiguous, and not all that emotionally satisfying. It's pretty depressing, actually, to think about how everything they said would happen there is not happening, and trying to figure out solutions, ways out, is just not very invigorating stuff for those who thrive on Hating and Warring Against Evil.

As a result, attention gets turned to immigration -- Mexican immigration specifically. It entails the opportunity to rail against "appeasement" (of Vincente Fox); to create the anti-terrorist/pro-terrorist dichotomy on which they thrive; and to demonize a clear, foreign enemy as threatening not just our economic prosperity but also our national security (the "Mexican invaders"). And if the weakened, ready-to-be-tossed aside failure, George Bush, is one of the spineless appeasers this time, so be it.