Bill Bennett had Jim Talent on his show this morning speaking for Romney and Pete King for Rudy on immigration. It was a worthwhile discussion but I would have loved to have heard the candidates themselves. In the case of Giuliani, Congressman King was still arguing that the mayor hasn’t changed his views. I don’t understand that. It seems like it would be very easy for Rudy to deal with the YouTubes and excerpts from Hizzoner Past by saying, hey, it’s a different world. I didn’t get it then, I do now. That he doesn’t could be telling though (i.e. his pathway to citizenship embrace). We’ll see.

We have an editorial today on all of this here. I’d encourage Romney and Rudy to push back against Mel Martinez. It strikes me as the know-nothings of today are the folks who insist that there’s an intolerance behind sensible immigration law and order. (They’re not nativists of course, but accuse people of good will of being bigots. I care to know nothing about my opponents and their reasoning — people who just happen to be a lot of my natural political allies.) And if Romney and Rudy are right, they would be wise to bring good order and common sense and decency to this debate. We all like immigrants. We all know immigrants. Most of us hail from immigrants. But let’s talk about what it means to be an American. It means some basic agreement on law and order.

Anyway, from our editorial:

No amnesty for our illegal-immigrant population should even be considered until border crossings have been dramatically reduced, a reliable worker-verification system is in place, and foreign visitors can be effectively tracked. We hope that the pragmatic, tough-minded Giuliani will recognize that his enforcement pledge will be fatally undermined by his amnesty promise.
The recent debate over immigration reform revealed broad support for securing our borders and strong opposition to amnesty for illegal aliens. While GOP Chairman Martinez counsels politicians to ignore this popular sentiment, politicians should and will be rewarded for listening to voters.

More here.