Maybe if he had had more than sixty seconds to describe a possible program, he would have gotten around to birthright citizenship.

Perhaps a follow-up question about birthright citizenship would have been in order.

Reno_Dave, in bringing up his secondary point about anchor babies, seems to be conceding on Gingrich's overall appalling vision.

Gingrich talks as if he thinks that denying citizenship to legalized illegal aliens is a severe restriction. But it's absolutely toothless, since THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT CITIZENSHIP, which just gives them access to voting and subjects them to jury duty. Instead, they care about LEGAL RESIDENCY, so they don't have to go back to their crummy countries of origin.

So Gingrich is snookering ignorant Repub primary voters with this ploy, or he knows too little and is actually snookering himself, too.

And anything that lets illegal aliens stay here legally -- no matter what euphemism someone serves up -- is amnesty and is totally unacceptable.

Excellent Mr. Krikorian.

I am sorry to joke, with a poor effort, but I have to wonder if Newt believes it is inhumane to capture, detain, kill, Terrorists because they too have nice Families?

Shouldn't we close Gitmo?

Shouldn't we humanely free all those mean American Prisons, because criminals also have well intentioned Family connections?

Case by case, we can clearly see by Newt's grandstanding, law matters little if we hurt the Family.

Look at the mess this evil USA has made for the Madoff Family, surely we have been inhumane in this case as well.

Let's not forget, Mr. Gaddafi was a father as well!

On that note, weren't we supposed to stop "meddling" via "smart power"?

Let's just take a step further with Newt Gingrich's Beltway Insider trading business!

Let's simply put the Celebrity Public Sector Politician's placation to so many via another MSM performance in it's full perspective. Let's cut to the chase, as the "case by case" scenario will be seen as unjust in the realm of social justice for all Families and their loved ones in any case. No law will be humane to any potential victim and their hard working Families regardless - so let's simply get rid of them. Democrats were right all along!

As everyone should be able to make a corrupt career unfettered with silly rules and legal mumbo jumbo - to appear on TV condemning the same Public Sector nightmare that fills your own pocket!

Newt is on to something...

How dare we suggest Nancy Pelosi was clearly crooked exploiting Our US Military for her own personal airline, how inhumane we were not to consider her Family and their needs for travel.

The problem is 'birthright citizenship' is directly contrary to the 14th Amendment.

There's a qualifier there, you're not a citizen simply by virtue of being born here. You're only a citizen if born here AND are subjuct to jurisdiction here at the time of your birth. In other words, if the parents are both foreign nationals, so is the child.

The problem isn't with Gingrich's guest worker program.

The problem is that the federal government grants citizenship to people in direct contravention to the clear text of the Constitution.

The "control the borders" argument fails to acknowledge that half of those in our country without papers have overstayed visas. These folks came in legally as visitors, students, legal workers, etc. and they overstayed their visas. They would not have been stopped at a border by some guy with a gun.
It would seem that the immigration reform issue, like so many other issues, has Republican "conservatives" trying not to make themselves look like fools. The problem is that when you try to take a position that you really do not believe in, you get caught at some point. I heard Laura Ingram on the radio saying that she thinks Newt's position on immigration is good, politically, but then she went on to say that she thinks we should kick them all out. It is that kind of a mentality that will defeat the Republican candidate in 2012. And the country will be the better for it.

You're wrong, and there are two things to think about:

First, an anchor baby can sponsor an overseas spouse and any children of his own when he reaches 18. Three years later when he reaches 21, he can sponsor his parents and any siblings... EACH of these individuals can then sponsor their own family members, spouses, and so on. Over 2/3 of the aliens granted legal permanent residency every year are family sponsored. That's just existing law.

Second, there's an administrative component. Is there any political will to deport an illegal alien mother, aka: "separate a mother from her citizen child"? No democrat president will do so, and it's questionable whether Newt would. The point is that birth on U.S. soil often results in an administrative pass from deportation.

The "red card" proposal just kicks the can down the road until a democrat president comes along and grants full citizenship to all the quasi-legal illegal aliens who have been "victimized by the mean-spirited red card plan created by the Gingrich administration."

The sob story writes itself. La Raza would be happy with Gingrich's proposal. They see the long-term plan.