Friday, November 02, 2007

HILLARY CLINTON

How Did the Clintons Miss the Polling on the Driver's Licenses Issue?

Here's the question I'm hearing from people this morning. The Clintons are masters of watching the polls and measuring the public before taking a public position.

CNN, last month:

Blacks and whites overwhelmingly oppose state governments issuing driver's licenses to illegal immigrants, with 76 percent of blacks and 83 percent of whites taking that stance, the poll said.

How does this happen? What's more, in the Post today, the tone is that the Republicans have the losing side of the issue here:

Former Clinton aide Simon Rosenberg, head of NDN, a Democratic think tank, said that despite Clinton's answer and Spitzer's problems in New York, Democrats will win the argument if they show they have a "big vision."

"The way this is going to be fought out is not over isolated incidents like this, but whether there are leaders in this country who have a big vision to solving a vexing problem," Rosenberg said. "Every Democrat in this country is for comprehensive immigration reform. The Republicans have a different position that doesn't poll as well: orienting themselves toward complaining instead of solving the problem."

As long as Republicans avoid any Tancredo-style "Miami is a third-world country" style comments, they're on the winning side by a large margin. It's the other side that keeps trying to give illegal immigrants things that U.S. citizens don't get — immunity from failing to pay taxes in the past, in-state tuition in any state, driver's licenses without U.S.-recognized forms of identification...

11/02 10:38 AMShare