The theme is developing fast in high-Republican circles: One reason McCain lost in November was that he was insufficiently enthusiastic about mass illegal immigration. He didn’t hispander enough. A correspondent in the Beehive State:

Mr. Derbyshire — I’m not quite sure I can top the Times-Onion, but I can match it.
In Utah our governor, the silver-spoon-fed Jon Hunstman Jr., sought to delay an impending law that he signed last year that would require the State of Utah to help enforce immigration laws. He justified his stand with this quote: “Something remarkable has happened since we last debated this in a most emotional fashion … [illegal aliens who can’t find jobs] are now going back.” Oh, and he also got re-elected.
Then he continued (the Deseret News only paraphrases): “One reason national Republicans took a beating in the 2008 elections is because they lost the Hispanic vote by 2-to-1 to Democratic candidates, and the ‘critical’ tone of Republicans on immigration was a big factor in those numbers.”
That “critical tone” must’ve come from nativist Republican nominee John McAmnesty, whom Huntsman endorsed in 2007 well ahead of the primaries.
All does not stop there, however. Just this Friday our state senate passed a resolution (almost unanimously) asking the feds for the right to create our own guestworker program/amnesty in order to “address Utah’s need for both unskilled and skilled laborers.”

[The resolution is here. Full access details here. Tracked through the state legislature here.]

Plainly there is no unemployment problem in Utah. The state has jobs to spare — so many, the governor and legislature are exercised over how to prevent illegal immigrants from leaving. And it was John McCain’s strident nativism that lost us the election. Uh-huh.

Can anything be done to stop this before it totally becomes conventional wisdom, like the Pete Wilson urban legend?