Republican Debate 11/22/2011 - The "Weird" Never Goes Out of These "Debates" if you can call them that.

Finally, one of he candidates says something that reflects an the understanding of political, economic and social dynamics of the immigration issue, and he is attacked for this understanding by the blood-thirsty wolves running at the back of the pack.  Attacked not because what Newt Gringrich is at all new, but because those failing candidates like Herman Cain and Michelle Bachmann, need to do something to raise their campaigns from the doldrums of public opinion and must therefore must contest with each other to achieve the status of frontrunner of the lunatic Republican fringe.

Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker said the our country would never deport millions of illegal immigrants, except perhaps recent arrivals with few family or community ties.  He was attacked by other debate participants as being soft on illegal immigration.

He said, “'I do not believe that the people of the United States are going to take people who have been here a quarter of a century … and expel them. “I’m prepared to take the heat for saying, ‘Let’s be humane.’”

No one who has read even small excerpts from this blog could ever believe I find Mr. Gingrich a good choice for the highest office in the land.  But, the man who took partisanship to new heights while Speaker, ought to know a polarizing approach to immigration reform, something this country badly needs, when he sees one.  Any other approach will prove so polarizing that nothing will get done - similarly to that which is happening now to budget reform.  In that process, the Republicans have taken the scorched earth policy and decreed that if they can't have everything they want and everyone else none of what they want, then they will be perfectly happy to see that nothing gets done because it relieves them of their elected responsibilities to lead the country forward and not mired in unresolved debate by, of course, blaming the Democrats.

Is it too much to hope that Mr. Gingrich's boldness will draw his opponents toward reality and appeal the the great "moderate" center of U.S. voters?  I hope he continues on this track and, if necessary, drag the rest of these Republican hopefuls back from the out-of-this world alternate universe in which they appear to live.