Obama and illegals: is it constitutional?
So, who’s right about Obama’s announcement that, at least on his watch, we won’t be deporting any more illegals who came here as children with their illegal-immigrant parents: Utah’s Attorney General Mark Shurtleff, who says it’s well within the president’s power to decide not to enforce the law, or lawyer John Yoo, he of the Bush administration, who says Obama overreached in a manner that sets a dangerous precedent?
Shurtleff (who is a Republican, as the MSM makes sure to report, although he’s atypical in that he supports the president’s general policies on immigration, not just this order) says:
Law enforcement makes decisions based on the resources available to them ”” until Congress acts, we’ll be left with too many people to deport,” Shurtleff said. “The administration is saying, `Here’s a group we could be spending our resources going after, but why? They’re Americans, they see themselves as Americans, they love this country.’”
Shurtleff added that the decision, by allowing children brought here illegally to go to school and work, could encourage them to stay out of gangs ”” which he called a “conservative” goal. He dismissed the claim that this would encourage further illegal immigration, noting that the president’s plan has a cutoff ”” you are only eligible if you came here before you turned 16 and are younger than 30, and have been in the country for at least five continuous years.
Shurtleff’s second point is short-sighted, since the encouragement of further illegal immigration could easily occur because people might understandably consider that further down the road this sort of thing could become American policy, or could at least be extended by a friendly liberal president of the future.
As for Shurtleff’s second suggestion—that Obama’s action is a perfectly acceptable discretionary decision about how best to use our law enforcement resources—I’m with Yoo on that [emphasis added]:
The president’s right to refuse to enforce unconstitutional legislation, of course, does not apply here. No one can claim with a straight face that the immigration laws here violate the Constitution.
The second exception [to the rule that presidents must enforce laws passed by the legislature] is prosecutorial discretion, which is the idea that because of limited resources the executive cannot pursue every violation of federal law. The Justice Department must choose priorities and prosecute cases that are the most important, have the greatest impact, deter the most, and so on. But prosecutorial discretion is not being used in good faith here: A president cannot claim discretion honestly to say that he will not enforce an entire law ”” especially where, as here, the executive branch is enforcing the rest of immigration law.
Imagine the precedent this claim would create. President Romney could lower tax rates simply by saying he will not use enforcement resources to prosecute anyone who refuses to pay capital-gains tax. He could repeal Obamacare simply by refusing to fine or prosecute anyone who violates it.
So what we have here is a president who is refusing to carry out federal law simply because he disagrees with Congress’s policy choices. That is an exercise of executive power that even the most stalwart defenders of an energetic executive ”” not to mention the Framers ”” cannot support.
“Cannot support”? Ha! They can, and will, if they like the outcome.
As for Obama—this act of his doesn’t surprise me. It just surprises me that it took him so long.
It sets a very dangerous precedent, as Yoo points out. And get ready for more where that came from, even if Obama is defeated. There’s always that time between the November election and the inauguration in January in which to do some mischief.
Clearly unconstitutional.
Obama hasn’t even tried to frame this any other way than it’s his opinion our current federal law is wrong so he will abide by his own opinion and not the law of the United States.
Further, the timing of the move, coinciding with his absolute need to stop his slide, shows Obama makes law inimical to the security of our nation and for his own benefit. Consider the recent leaks of Stuxnet and seal team efforts.
So his announcement is not an executive order. Big deal. He is following his law, not federal law.
And then we have the “children shouldn’t suffer, because they weren’t responsible.” Number one, how about Obama worrying about American children and number two we know the parents as well as the children won’t be deported.
Add now, one of our own, Utah’s AG Mark Sherteff, who, amazingly, argues the “ends justifies the means” to state elementary wrong law. Makes me agree more and more with rickl’s article that Republicans and Democrats are nothing more than a diverting sideshow.
You have to wonder about how conservative the Utah AG is. Rubio wants the same sort of outcome but does not like Obama’s bypassing of Congress. Couldn’t the AG have waited for Rubio’s announcement and said ‘me too?’
It’s not a “precedent”. It’s a crime. It’s totally and unquestioningly as un-Constitutional as it gets. And Mittens’ response is pathetic. He sucks.
I’m held hostage to having to vote for the GOP candidate (becuase this nation is truly finished if the Third World Dog-Eating Retard is re-elected) but I really dislike Mittens intensely and want to see him impeached and thrown out not long after after his inauguration. I still hold out slim hopes that the GOP will get their head straight and understand what they are toying with and hold a little coup at the Convention to get a candidate who’s willing to actually defend our Constitution .. but I doubt it.
Just the push for amnesty is what killed the GOP in 2006 and 2008 and made the party a pariah. The idiots don’t even remember the history of the last decade. THis is beyond pathetic. Unreal.
And Rubio and the Utah AG can both take a flying leap. THey disgust me. I never liked Rubio. He showed his true colors when he refused to defend Arizona and was pretty happy tosee the feral government ally with an invading enemy in an assault on an American State. If he is even considered for VP then it might just all be over.
America had a good run but this looks like this might be it. No one in government seems to have the courage to actually defend our Constitution – the foundation of our Constitutional Republic (not a Democracy) and there’s nothing left without our Supreme Law. Of course, this has been going on since the first moment the Dog-Eater slimed into office. Now, we have even certified that “empathy” is a legitimate main criterion for judges or their rulings – in direct opposition to over three millenia of Western jurisprudence (Ex 23:3
“neither shalt thou favour a poor man in his cause.”).
All good things must come to an end. It’s shame this is such a pathetic, stupid, and cowardly end at the hands of a Third World America-hater.
Progress/Peace: One can never, ever assure the success of anything. But one can always assure defeat simply by giving up. Don’t. The stakes, not just for us in our time, but for everyone, for all time, are too high.
The countermove by the next Congress should be to pass a Dream Act that gives permanent residence status to all it applies to (those who were brought here prior to 16 years of age) – a status that does not include a pathway to citizenship (ever) and thus no right to vote, and is stripped of any avenue to sponsor other immigrants (such as the parents who brought the illegal little tike to begin with).
Cap’n Rusty,
I haven’t quite given up. I hold out the slim hope that something can be salvaged. Like I said, I’ll vote for the GOP candidate, no matter how distasteful I find the person and his policies, but I just think that the train is moving pretty fast now and has built up quite a bit of inertia. Many on the right seem to think that merely voting the Indonesian out will solve everything, but damage as extensive and deep as has been done to the foundational framework of our nation over the past three+ years cannot be repaired simply with the removal of the offenders from office. We cannot fix this nation on the cheap. Those who have broken our most important law must be held to account – and I just don’t see that ever happening.
When the law has been so overtly and blatantly and brazenly broken as we have seen it’s faith in the institutions of government that suffers. That faith isn’t restored by people saying, “Okay … from NOW on, we’ll follow the law … even though we won’t prosecute those who have broken it and brought us to the brink.” It’s like a spouse who cheats. Trust doesn’t return just because the spouse says it’s all over now. Sometimes you just can’t repair broken trust. You have to start over.
I’ve been warning (in my own little way in blog comments and such) about this eventuality since the Dog-Eater first won in 2008. People forget that his supporters even wanted George Bush to step down and let the retard take over the office in December of 2008 (which was a clear sign that law meant absolutely nothing to them or the Dog-Eater). I held out hope that we had some defenders in Congress who, though they might not have any real power, would still take their oaths seriously. A few did. But after the Tea Party gave the GOP a new life in 2010 and the GOP turned around and colluded with the dems on that insane lame duck session (also a repulsive act of intense magnitude) and went on to cave to the Dog-Eating Retard and his dems through all of 2011 … my hope faded. It was becoming increasingly clear where we were headed.
Like I said, I hold out the last speck of hope for the election and will cast my vote the only way it can be cast – with the GOP – but I really am not holding my breath for America’s likelihood of being able to remain a COnstitutional Republic. I think that ship has long sailed. We saw Barky explain his real opinion of Constitutional Republics in his insane defense of his tin-foil buddy Zelatya’s coup attempt in Honduras. He kept hounding on the “he was elected” versus the Rule of Law. Again, it was clear then where this was all headed for us.
I anticipate, if there is anything of America left, that we will see a split of this nation. That is probably the only way for the American creed to continue, because the US isn’t up to carrying it. We’ll see. Hopefully I’m just wrong about all of this … I don’t mean to get you down, but I really haven’t been able to believe what has been happening before my eyes for the last 4 years and this last move is so brazen and so clearly illegal and un-American that it just boggles the mind. Not that it was unexpected, but the reaction to it by our alleged defenders on the Hill and in the GOP leadership is as disappointing as I could possibly express. Sorry for being so pessimistic.
Wisconsin needs to inform us here. Walker stood strong and prevailed. There is one difference, however: Walker had results to point too.
So how should Romney respond? It’s a critical question because Florida and Colorado and other swing states could be lost (and don’t forget voter fraud).
There’s an answer and it is the opposite of pandering and vagueness. Romney needs to show he is a man of principle and that he will enforce the laws of the United States.
Ultimately, Obama’s Fausitian deal will not change the balance if Romney shows his morality is not political and changing.
I would remind that that which cannot be had by the government at one fell swoop it takes in increments… and now, it seems, by diktat. Who new representative democracy could run so smoothly?
President Romney should announce that his Administration will not enforce the laws pertaining to EEOC, affirmative action, and the environment. (Can’t enforce everything, you know.) THEN all the Reds will become strict constructionists faster than you can say “Ribbentrop-Molotov.”
What Obama is doing isn’t so unusual. I remember reading Andrew Jackson remarked about a Supreme Court decision he didn’t care for something to the effect – now let them enforce it. Or I remember Nixon disagreeing with some spending and refusing to release the funds seriously constipating a bunch of Congress people not to mention pundits all around.
Obama is doing Romney a favor. If Romney believes that cutting spending and government is the pathway to a real recovery, Obama is handing a precedent to withhold significant spending for not only Obamacare, but the EPA, Dept of Education and he can simply cut staff levels – drastically – and by the time the howls die down we might see some improvement in the economy and all will be forgiven.
Yoo, you is ‘Yo.
The Obama program violates “fairness.”
The people given two year deferments are those most able to survive deportation most easily. The must be under 30 and in high school, graduated high school, or have an honorable discharge from the Armed Services.
Is this fair or give an advantage to those who are already at the top of illiegal alien society?
One other point. Since entrees will be allowed to apply for work authorization, the claim of the passive “prosecutorial discretion” is not valid.
Obama is assuming that voters won’t think about the effect on the labor force and unemployment. Black voters won’t figure out that they will be hurt the most. He also assumes that voters won’t care if there is an uptick in illegal aliens bringing their children with them. As with all other answers to the problem of the resident population of aliens, You first must seal the border and go after employers who hire illegals.
Black voters won’t figure out that they will be hurt the most.
You’re doubtless right, and yet one has to wonder how anyone could fail to grasp this critical point.
Of course this diktat by our Stuttering Clusterf*ck of a Miserable Tyrant is illegal. But then, Owebama’s been illegal since he swore an oath (twice) at his inauguration to protect and defend the Constitution. He’s not a natural born-citizen and knows it (why else bury all those records?), yet all everybody talks about is whether he was born in the US or not, i.e., birther crapola. That’s a moot point, but is now the narrative happily framed for us by our Pravda Media. If The constitution lists three types of citizenship, native-born, naturalized and, for the top two elected jobs, natural-born, then there must be a difference between the three, more than just the natural-born = native-born fraudulent ‘analysis’ from just about 99% of the media (all media, including Fox). Owebama’s never proven his qualifications for the job he now holds and seeks to hold again.
Otiose: Saying that Obama is providing Romney with a precedent is like saying Bernie Madoff is providing my investment adviser with a precedent.
Obama wants badly for the subject to be anything other than the economy. You just have to smile a little at the desperation in this.
I don’t know what the numbers are. Some say 1 million new green card holders. Neil Munro, the Daily Caller reporter who asked Obama how this would affect American workers, was spot on with his question. In a time of high unemployment is it a good thing to suddenly add more people to the rolls of those legally looking for work? That is the idea that Romney should concentrate on. Most voters may not know or care if the Constitution has been violated, but they sure as heck care about President Obama’s failure to be a friend to the average worker.
Congressman Steve King, (R – Iowa) says he plans to sue the administration for implementing something that he believes should have required legislative process and approval. Read about it here: http://tinyurl.com/d4l64wu
If he does sue, I think that will help keep the issue in the public eye and publicize the way conservatives feel about such high handedness by Obama. If he wins, it will be a step forward in trying to rein in government by proclamation.
This is pretty outrageous. My blood boiled a little.
And it should be noted that Yoo is by no means a rabid partisan in his application of his theory of executive power – he has defended Obama’s use of it many times in the past (e.g., on Libya). Point being, there is nobody who has a more expansive understanding of what the executive can do than John Yoo – or I should say, there is no one who has a legitimate and principled understanding as expansive as his.
So when he says this is clearly unconstitutional, it means something. Case closed, in other words.
Re: progressoverpeace –
Don’t worry about pessimism – I hear myself in your sullen reflections, except you have a humorous saltiness that makes them more entertaining to read than my own (e.g., I love how you apply like ten different nicknames for Obama in a single paragraph – something Mencken-esque about it).
Your remarks about the disappearance of America as a genuinely Constitutional republic are spot on. I wrote an email to a friend yesterday saying that if Romney or other future Presidents do not rule like dictators it will be solely out of their own prudence and/or principles. It will not be because there is much of anything left in the Constitution stopping them (which means a culture of willingness to enforce Constitutional limitations). This is why the Obamacare case is so singularly important. Worrying about it costs me sleep.
We are very close to being in “wishing for a good emperor instead of a bad emperor” territory.
One thing though – I agree with you that Romney will not change any of that intrinsically, and my opinion of him is, let’s just say, skeptical. However, I don’t know if there’s anything he could do to change it. He could try to lead Constitutionally, but then when the next Democrat gets in office, it’s back to dictatorship. This is a matter of serial precedents which have been accumulating ever since Wilson and FDR. On the other side, it’s a matter of an evolving understanding of our republic and our Constitution by the people that is best classified as “thin.”
Manners and mores, in short. Romney could probably make some baby steps to patching up these festering wounds – through education policy, perhaps. After that, I start to draw a blank. As the Marxists like to say, the problem is “structural.”
Or as normal people say, “We’re f***ed.”
Well, no, Kolnai.
The thing that will stop them is people electing representatives who govern and appoint judges who represent the people’s directives.
If the people change, the government will change.
And, as always has been the case, the change doesnt mean suddenly everybody becomes a Goldwater conservative. It means there is a controlling percentage of them and that controlling percentage is not lethargic.
I’m black and I support the president’s plan.
I support it because he needs to get re-elected and this will help get him more voters.
Anything justifies the means!!!
Caio
Let’s
go
to
the
Lobby
and get us all some snacks.
Proved with longitudinal study at the KKK college of white superiority studies program:
Many oppose Romney because he’s white.
I’m wondering if this is largely a con of Hispanic voters with an impact which might be rather small. If you have to be a HS graduate or veteran that means age 18 at a minimum with a ceiling of 30. Given the high drop out rate of minority students and the small number of illegal aliens who would even apply for the armed forces, how many people would qualify. To apply for the program you have to say your parent brought you in illegally. Wouldn’t you have to identify your parent(s)? Who would want to do that? The number of real young people who would get residence and a work permit might be very small.
The net effect could be to pick up lots of votes and help very few people. We know how that worked out for black voters and college students.
All that said, Obama is acting outside of the law. It’s a Chicago thing.
“… There’s always that time between the November election and the inauguration in January in which to do some mischief. ”
= = = = =
It’s interesting to note that Islam has ALWAYS had severe, yet effective, methods (cough, cough, ahem) for dealing with anyone who “spreads mischief in the land”. {Hurries to add: “NOT that I’m recommending an Islamic solution here.”}
= = = = =
SteveH said (June 16th, 2012 at 6:21 pm)
“Obama wants badly for the subject to be anything other than the economy. You just have to smile a little at the desperation in this.”
Nope, I’m not smiling. I’m kind of tending toward progressoverpeace’s pessimism. The fact that DumCluk got elected in the FIRST place is sufficient evidence that the problems of this nation are way, WAY beyond any kind of quick fix. And yeah, I know somebody up there said “just elect better men to represent you”. Sure. Except they somehow go all soft-in-the-spine when they hit the Emerald City.
Well, we are damaged people. I don’t know many exceptions. But that doesn’t mean we should not try.
Stay away from unhappy people since most of them are angry they cannot do life well enough. Ironic how the greatest of all crafts is the least of all crafts and equally open to all and equally failed by all.
True it is that any real success is not emotional, but work, hard work, earned at the expense of leisure, pleasure and equity. Life, as many have observed, is not fair. But the upshot is that those who enjoy life are those who have earned it.
At the least put up boundaries against those foolish enough to attempt to defy life. Much like the blind man feels the beauty of what he cannot see, the beauty of a righteous boundary is beyond compare; it is the unbreakable wall. God is that; somehow, He is both mover and resister. Being made in His image, we are as well, just less so.
Only the power of a soul in true despair attempts the grey granite of God’s commandments: that is, to obey and subdue the unruly points of his nature. This, this is true poetry and poetry is the opposite of man’s gargantuan appetite.
The universities have it wrong. They attempt to teach poetry through feeling and fashion and fecundity. What a farce! Poetry is seed, is the state before embroyo, is the gasp of parent meeting child, and it is the opposite of emotional feel good feeling. It is pain; it is the requisite of life. Naked and bloody we came in. Naked and bloody we live. Naked and bloody we graduate.
Any man or woman may live large. That is no point for respect. It is rightly observed that the true rebel is not he who lives without restraint but he who accepts an unlivable and uncompromisable restraint which will judge him harshly and without bias. In this judgment, he will fail, but succeed because he accepted a standard of judgment not his own.
On a positive note, here is a nice tribute video someone made to celebrate the recent SpaceX Dragon mission.
I followed the whole nine-day flight closely, getting up in the middle of the night to watch the launch and even taking a vacation day from work to watch the grapple and berthing, but this is a good five-minute “highlight reel”.
The cheering crowd are the SpaceX employees, watching their hard work and long waiting come to fruition. I never get tired of watching those scenes. They still bring tears of joy to my eyes.
Congratulations SpaceX – Dragon Makes History
Curtis –
We will have to agree to disagree. Electing the right people is a stopgap, not a solution – what matters in the long run is what Aristotle called the “characteristics” of the people (I would think this would be your take as well – shows what I know).
At any rate, we agree that we do need to elect the right people.
…Actually, on second thought I’m not sure we’re disagreeing at all. I’m not sure what you’re saying “no” to in what I said.
I think, on another look, you’re saying that if the people (as in us, the people people) straighten up enough to put representatives and thus judges in office who are Constitutionalists, then that’s the only answer. And I agree with that.
What made me say we’re screwed is that I I don’t believe that will happen. So if your “no” meant that you think it will happen, fair enough. No shocka that I’m hung up on the bleaker side of things.
The Constitution has been a dead letter for a very long time, at least since Marshall’s usurpation of the power to judge the validity of laws.
This may not be a bad thing. All of our current problems derive directly from the Constitution. We get an illegitimate, lawless government because that is what a majority of the voters chose. Knowingly, I might add.
It you want reform, scrap the Constitution and return to the Articles of Confederation. If you don’t like the Articles, then break up the country into several or a dozen or 50 or more independent states. And join the one you like.
Right analysis as usual, Kolnai.
I claim we will prevail. Our history isn’t one of peace, really, or even happiness. It is more one of struggle to provide and preserve freedom. I think many believe this history is coming to a close. And I surely cannot blame them.
But our history gives me a clue. Freedom is deeply ingrained in our past, institutions, culture, religions, and people. I believe it is being preserved, slowly and not in a systematic way, but being preserved. And making a comeback as we battle for our religious freedom and to educate our children. That is the real battle.
What preserves is faith. Another way of saying it is people of faith are ahead of the curve. There are many good and decent secular conservatives. But they lack the belief in the battle of good v evil. They also lack faith in a power which preserves and a belief in help from another quarter.
But even there, there is a built-in stabalizer as results become too large to ignore. The question is, will the forces for tyranny have seized enough control to defeat and then enslave those who have learned.
(And there are also many good and decent people whose upbringing has caused them to view big business as the main enemy. Obama is opening their eyes that the Left as much as the Right is capable of corruption for money. So there’s that development too. Notice the union vote for Walker)
Our current crisis corresponds with the decline of reglious faith. But faith on the left is declining too. As it must because faith based on falseness must fail. I was just reading the estimable Mr. Schneiderman’s article on how Freud has been completely discredited.
http://stuartschneiderman.blogspot.com/2012/05/freud-files.html
So, maybe, we stand not on the precipice of defeat, but on the beginning of a slow but sure reform and return and respect for the wisdoms of tradition and Scripture.
I do believe we will not escape the consequences of debt. We shall suffer and we should suffer. But if one has faith that suffering is redemptive and will build a future for our children, then our history will contain another chapter in that fight of good against evil.
Just a little snack here, for, you.
http://townhall.com/video/gov.-scott-walker-hits-obama-economic-policies
The good stuffs at the end.
“Out and Out lawlessness.” That’s Charles the Great Krauthammer’s verdict on Obam-Bam’s newest illegal alien outrage. Works for me.
Thanks Curtis. And you do make a very compelling case; my problem is that I’m compelled by two sides of an argument that can’t coexist.
I’m not sure there’s many people here who share your exact diagnosis of the “deep” cause of decline as revolving around faith, but I’m actually one who does. And I’m a tormented agnostic.
I’ll close by saying that I’m glad your on my side (or that I’m on yours), and it really is the faith that you and others share that will, if anything will, save us from oblivion. My brand of “sad warriorism” (cut from the Whittaker Chambers cloth) only works if happier warriors are leading the charge.
P.S. – Yuck. I meant “you’re.” I hate making that mistake.
An honest and beautiful reply, kolnai.
I do not have your scholarship. Couldn’t have. It requires a personality really given to and loving research and study. I don’t think you know how much we need you and others like you. It’s a thing a beauty when you and others post the truth, the facts . . . the history.
Isn’t the fact that the Bible is so filled with history a clue? Good historians tell the truth of the past and without that truth, there is no argument against those who lie about the past. This simple truth, more than any other, has led to our current crisis. Lies form the foundation of illiberal claims. America was slandered, and according to the Bible, this was the first attack, which was to accuse the good guy of being a bad guy. And there has not been an effective counter voice (many exceptions, especially lately, eg: Amy Shlaes: The Forgotten Man).
Recently, someone commented on the Silmarillion which was Tolkein’s pre middle earth creation. The amount of detail, language, and story is truly astonishing. I loved it from the get go. Because I recognized it. It was a restatement of Genesis.
Ea, who is God, created the Valor, who are beings of immense power and immortality. There is, of course, a bad guy, but one of the seven Valor was Tulkas, the happy warrior.
And Tulkas is no irrational stupid clod. But he is first and foremost a partisan, one who needs no convincing, and one who counters the sadness of those lamenting. He fights and when he stops it is because he cannot fight any longer.
Lamentations are necessary but they cannot be the whole body. Fighting likewise. Tulkas cannot carry the day on his own. He is at once, both reserve strength and projection. Without that which projects him, he will not survive long.
Our greatest advantage is also our greatest weakness. Without unity we perish. Without your confidence and enthusiasm, we perish. And leave the world in darkness.
Curtis –
How about we close the thread with those remarks?
IMO the ideals of the founding have been sliding down hill ever since the Whiskey Rebellion was suppressed and the enactment of the Aliens and Sedition Acts.
Shurtleff is right, and I’m a conservative.
The problem with these types of decrees is that they are easily undone at any time, as quickly as they were done. Romney can, if he wants, just cancel the directive as soon as he takes office and start deporting all those illegals who thought they had a lock on staying here.
Without engaging Congress, he just creates additional uncertainty out there, which is why presidents need to wield their power wisely.
IMO, this is a very unwise move and very unstatesmanlike. Regardless of my position on illegal immigration, he is creating temporary situations in areas of deep polarization.
A couple of points:
1: I’ve mentioned before the spring survey of 16,000 voters in the 18-29 year old demographic. It showed that the single most important issue to these voters is jobs and the economy, followed by the debt. Student loans were a distant third, all other issues were lost in the noise. While Obama received strong support from blacks and hispanics, among white voters 55% felt that he should not be reelected. This move will dump up to 800,000 17-29 year olds into the job market to compete for jobs when 54% of new college grads are unable to find work of any kind.
2: The actual wording of the policy to extend the two year safe harbor not just to children brought here my their parents, but to illegals who crossed the border on their own initiative or how paid smugglers to get them across. So much for “no fault of their own”.
This will prove a losing proposition for Obama. It will galvanize young white voters who already are uncomfortable with him to vote against his reelection and further alienate blue collar voters.
One more thing. Yes I too would like to see a strong response from Romney. However, that would be the wrong thing for him to do at this point. Obama had two possibly three goals: energize hispanics to turnout and to contribute, possibly motivate the youth vote, and most important to knock Romney off message and distract voters from the mess Obama’s made in the last 42 months. At this point in the campaign Romney handled this exactly right. He has left others to argue the constitutional and legal issues and point out Obama’s over reach, while he continues to hammer away at Obama’s record.
If we are to stop Obama’s abuses we must unseat him in November. That will be accomplished by persuading the middle of the road voter that Romney is better suited to fixing the economic issues that we face. Romney needs to stay focused on that, while the grass roots talk about other issues around the water cooler.