Paul Weyrich has a column in which he suggests that Pat Buchanan is being too pessimistic about the conservative movement.

(Of course, I remember when Weyrich was winning prizes for pessimism himself.)

But he makes a radical statement about the effect of immigration on the future of the Republican Party:

Can the movement fall apart? Of course, it can. If the Republican Leadership dramatically doesn’t change its immigration policy by early next year it could lose control of Congress. If this movement again fails to advocate smaller, less intrusive government it also could fall apart.

While President Bush is not conservative on everything, he is conservative enough to keep the movement from disintegrating unless he insists on an immigration policy opposed by 80% of the people.

ESR | June 6, 2005 | Conservatism: Criteria for consideration

That’s fairly strong, and it echoes something that David Frum has been telling Republicans; that there is trouble out there in Americaland, which is where the Bush voters are.

Will the GOP heed Weyrich before “early next year?” Seems unlikely, but the stakes are high, and we’ve been telling them here on VDARE.COM for nearly five years.

The Scottish patriot Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun is credited with the insight:

“if a man were permitted to make all the ballads, he need not care who should make the laws of a nation.”

Congratulations to my friend Jerry Kammer for a brilliant dramatization [Loophole to America – by Jerry Kammer, San Diego Union-Tribune ,June 4 2005] of the scandalous “Other than Mexican” new illegal immigration loophole, first identified, I believe, on this web site in early April, by Juan Mann.

Juan is a demanding, technically complex writer, inevitable given his subject. Jerry has conjured up a vivid version that will leave unmoved only a paid-up member of the Treason Lobby.

Once on the U.S. side, the Brazilians scrambled ashore and started looking for the Border Patrol… “We used to chase them; now they’re chasing us,” Border Patrol Agent Gus Balderas said as he frisked the Brazilians and collected their passports… The group was detained overnight and given a court summons that allowed them to stay in the United States pending an immigration hearing. Then a Border Patrol agent drove them to the McAllen bus station, where they continued their journey into America.
The formal term for the court summons is a “notice to appear.” Border Patrol agents have another name for it. They call it a “notice to disappear.”… a rapidly growing class of illegal immigrants from Central and South American…now see the Border Patrol more as a welcome wagon than a barrier.
The problem is that U.S. immigration authorities are short on detention space. …international law prohibits [U.S. immigration authorities] from sending non-Mexicans to Mexico.
As word of this border loophole filters back to Central and South America, the volume of people coming to exploit it is likely to grow, according to Border Patrol agents…. A Guatemalan arrested late last month in the McAllen sector who gave his name as Hugo said that when word gets back home, “Anyone who has a little money will be coming.”

The story contrasts the firm response of former Border Patrol Agent Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas)

“We need somebody with a stiff spine who can make a decision and say, We’re going to build a temporary detention facility,’”

with the arrogant negligence of the current ICE field office director of immigration detention and removal in San Antonio, Marc Moore

“Anytime you have temporary facilities… you have anxieties,”

Unsurprisingly, Marc Moore seems to prefer anonymity.