One Potential Fight This Week
Lonewacko mentioned it. TheHill.com provided the details. John and Ken identified the players.

First, John and Ken:

On one side of the GOP fault is the Wall Street Journal wing of the party so named for that newspaper's repeated editorial call, citing the cheap labor benefit to business interests, for a Constitutional amendment stating "There shall be open borders." The Wall Street Journal wing is typified by the lead Republican supporter in congress of amnesty for illegal aliens, Chris Cannon of Utah.

On the other side is the, well, democratic wing of the party, which stands with the 82 percent of self-identified Republican voters who, according to a recent Pew survey, support tighter immigration policies (Democrats and Independents both polled at 76 percent). The democratic wing is typified in congress by Republican Tom Tancredo of Colorado.

The two sides may end up colliding at Madison Square Garden on August 30.

Sources say that in recent weeks, word has gone out from Karl Rove’s office that Republican congressional candidates who fail to “stay away” from the issue of illegal immigration risk losing the financial support of their national party.

Now to TheHill.com:

Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) plans to start a nasty floor fight at the Republican National Convention in New York this week unless the GOP convention platform includes elements of his immigration proposals. He calls the current platform “weak” and “Clintonesque.”

The third-term former nonprofit-organization executive said he has already enlisted a groundswell of support from sympathetic delegates from border states such as California and Arizona.

In an interview late last week, Tancredo expressed frustration over his inability to obtain platform information from the Republican National Committee (RNC) or the names of platform committee delegates....

Last week he called for three amendments to be added to the platform: no driver’s
licenses for illegal aliens, no amnesty for illegal aliens and an agreement with Mexico on access to Social Security. That amendment states, “Republicans would oppose any treaty with any nation that allows access to Social Security for employment that occurred while an individual was not employed legally.”

Tancredo recalls vividly a conversation he had with President Bush’s top political adviser, Karl Rove, two years ago. Tancredo had given an interview to The Washington Times regarding his hard-line stance on immigration that upset Rove.

“[Rove] called me the next morning,” Tancredo recalled. “I was on my way to work. We had a spirited discussion. He told me never to darken the doorstep of the White House.” To which the congressman replied, “’I don’t remember a welcome mat ever being out, and second, it’s not your house.’”...

Tancredo said he believes that there ought to be a moratorium on immigration, that the number of immigrants who enter the United States should shrink to 300,000 for the next five years and that immigrants should abandon their native languages and assimilate into American society as quickly as possible. Last year, to the dismay of many lawmakers, he called for an end to race-based congressional caucuses.

It's mystifying why the Republicans are trying to hush this up, since both parties are battling toward the center. This is why John Kerry is battling to defend the medals that he doesn't really care about. Similarly, Bush could publicly defeat the three proposals. So what if he loses California's vote because of it? He'd never get California's vote anyway.

In 1992, Clinton picked a fight with Jesse Jackson and positioned himself well with the electorate as a result. Perhaps Bush could do the same.