The Hill: Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a key architect of the Senate’s comprehensive immigration reform bill, warned Tuesday that President Obama could use an executive order to legalize millions of illegal immigrants if Congress does not act on the issue.So, how do you get Republicans on board with immigration reform? Sell them an insane conspiracy theory. That’s what they’re used to and that’s what they like.
“I believe that this president tempted, will be tempted, if nothing happens in Congress, to issue an executive order as he did for the Dream Act kids a year ago, where he basically legalizes 11 million people by the sign of a pen,” Rubio told WFLA’s “The Morning Show with Preston Scott.”
"Now we won’t get any E-Verify, we won’t get any border security, but he’ll legalize them," he added.
"What’s particularly interesting here is that Rubio doesn’t think it’s enough to point out that the current situation is untenable," notes Greg Sargent. "According to GOP pollster Whit Ayres, even Republican primary voters, once they engage on the issue, agree that the current situation amounts to de facto ‘amnesty’ for the 11 million, and want to do something about it. But merely proposing to solve an existing problem won’t do it; Rubio thinks he needs to make inaction appear far more frightening to Republicans by also invoking Obama’s evil intentions, i.e., his secret desire to grant citizenship to them without securing the border.
"Here you have the makings of a way out of the GOP predicament. Republicans can embrace comprehensive reform as a way of frustrating Obama’s secret designs."
But how badly has the Republican Party and their press shop at Fox News and talk radio screwed up the heads of GOP voters? They won’t listen to reason anymore, so you have to cook up some insane and panic-inducing fairy tale about grand conspiracies and scary brown people taking over America.
I wonder when Republicans will realize they’ve taken propagandizing way too far?
Maybe it’s too late for that realization to make any difference. Maybe they already known they’ve twisted the minds of millions beyond any hope of rationality and, as Rubio’s finding out, the only way to lead them anymore is to play along with the paranoid madness the party has instilled in them.
[photo by Gage Skidmore]
