Summit’s over. Apparently, illegals are just “guests” we forgot to invite.

This isn’t the first time the president’s played fast and loose with labels in the context of immigration, either. Michelle nailed him on it a year ago.

Elsewhere at the summit, Vicente Fox displayed some cojones of his own. From the WaPo article linked above, open borders for thee but not for me:

Fox also noted that Mexico has its own migration problem.

“We are working in the inner part and in the southern part of the country to stop migration flows that come from Central America that are crossing illegally the southern border of Mexico,” he said. “And with all due respect to the dignity of these people, respecting their human rights, they are stopped, they remain on temporary basis in the stations. We offer them services with dignity. And then we send them back to their communities of origin: 240,000 people [have been] detained . . . and sent back to Central America.”

Back home, Dean-o makes a play for Hispanic votes by linking Bush to a bill he doesn’t actually support, then appeals to him to put a stop to all this divisive debate and discussion we’ve been having:

“This is a nonsensical proposal put out by far right-wingers in the Republican Party who have been endorsed for re-election by the president of the United States,” Dean said. “The president has a moral obligation to rein in the right-wing extremists in his party and stop this divisive rhetoric about immigrants.”

Ever divisive, Mickey Kaus connects illegal workers to lower wages for unskilled black Americans and wonders, “Why isn’t it the Dems who are split on immigration?” John Hawkins is being terribly divisive as well, asking and answering 13 questions about illegal immigration (and earning himself a mention from Rush Limbaugh in the process). And WaPo has a profile of Mr. Divisiveness, Tom Tancredo. Since it’s Friday night, go ahead and drink whenever the authors use the word “angry” or some variation thereof.

Finally, polls. Pew Research finds that 53% of Americans think illegal immigrants should be forced to leave, although that number splits roughly evenly on whether some temporary worker status should be granted first. Time magazine finds overwhelming support for a guest-worker program–no doubt much to the relief of Arlen Specter and Lindsey Graham–but 62% also want the federal government to take “whatever steps are necessary” to control the borders, even if it means deploying troops. A clear majority of 56% support a 2,000-mile-long fence.

Michelle’s post on Che’s cameos at the protests got buried beneath McKinney-mania earlier, so please check it out if you haven’t yet. And this too, which I’d completely missed — and which deserves a lot more attention than it’s getting.

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