LAT: Guest Worker Plan in Doubt (taxes, SS to be priorities?)

[DeepModem Mom]

Guest Worker Plan in Doubt
Bush vows to overhaul immigration laws, but others say most of his political capital will go to efforts to revise Social Security and tax system.

By Mary Curtius, Times Staff Writer


WASHINGTON — Even as President Bush stresses his commitment to reworking the nation's immigration laws, some key supporters on the issue say it is so politically divisive that they doubt he can achieve his goal, given the administration's ambitious agenda.

In interviews last week, Bush insisted he would pursue legislation that would legalize some of the estimated 8 million undocumented immigrants in the United States by granting them temporary worker status. Under his plan, illegal immigrants could apply for legal status and, if they qualified, could stay in the country for as long as six years.

Some conservative Republicans have denounced the plan as a form of amnesty, and say it would encourage illegal immigration. But Bush has said he would deal with the problem of illegal immigrants in a humane way. And he has linked the plan to national security....

***

.... several immigrant advocacy groups, labor unions and lawmakers who would be involved in such an initiative say the White House has not reached out to them to produce a bill that could overcome opposition among some Republicans and win the necessary support to pass. Some take that as a sign that the administration is going to spotlight other priorities — including overhauling Social Security and the tax system — this year....


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-immig18jan18,0,1445579.story?coll=la-home-headlines

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

1. He needs to gut the middle class first, give more rewards to his "base"

Think about it.

If he pushes through the "guest worker" program, he delivers cheap, no-benefits labor to his base, and they profit.

However, if he pushes through his "tax SIMPLIFICATION" plan...especially if it's in the favored mode he LIED ABOUT during the election, the "National Sales Tax"...then, as John Kerry put it, EVERY DAY BECOMES APRIL 15th for the working class. EVERY trip to the store will be like a trip to H&R block.

He is capable of doing more damage with the tax agenda. My guess is that he'll concentrate efforts there EXCLUSIVELY once he fails with the SS proposal.