Gingrich: Immigration bill "a sellout of every conservative principle"

Just one week after pulling the plug, Harry Reid is now ready to bring the immigration bill back to the Senate floor. What's more, Republican sellouts, such as John McCain, Jon Kyl, Trent Lott, and others, are on board for the mass amnesty.

So are the other top Republican candidates: Fred Thompson, Rudy Giuliani, and Mitt Romney. While McCain and the other Senators do not realize the anger with which tw0-thirds of the country views the bill, Thompson, Giuliani, and Romney are smart enough to change their views.

Smart in a slimy-politician way, that is.

Just within the last year or so, Giuliani was on board for a very similar type of immigration bill. He was not for an actual fence on the border; he was for a "technological one."

"What are the chances," writes Terry Jeffrey in his article "Mr. Security's Amnesty," George Steinbrenner, owner of Rudy Giuliani's favorite baseball team, could be persuaded to replace the physical barriers around Yankee Stadium with virtual ones, based on the premise that cameras and sensors could do a better job than actual walls and fences in keeping people out of the stadium when they had not paid for a ticket?"

In an interview, Giuliani said, "There's got to be a program to regularize the people that are here...."

Sean Hannity then asked him, "Does that mean amnesty, though?"

To which the former mayor replied, "It doesn't mean amnesty."

But, as Jeffrey said, "That's George W. Bush-talk for: Yes, it does mean amnesty."

Giuliani also, as mayor of New York City, opposed a bill that would have "stipulated that only citizens and certain legal immigrants were to receive food stamps and imposed financial penalties on states that did not verify the legal status of those applying for the stamps," writes Human Events' Amanda Carpenter.

Giuliani's beef, of course, was that it excluded illegals from food stamps and other aid.

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Romney, as he has done on every issue, changed his position once he started running for President.

When John McCain campaigned for him, he supported McCain's immigration policy -- saying it was not amnesty -- and McCain-Feingold campaign-finance reform. But now Romney -- rightfully -- rails against both.

He doesn't mention he supported both of those just a few years ago, though, and when combined with his change in his stance on abortion, embroyonic stem-cell research, gun control, gay marriage, and any number of other issues, it's tough to see it as a sincere switch.

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Tom Tancredo, perhaps the leading opponent of illegal immigration in Congress, said Fred Thompson's immigration policy "sucks."

Sometimes it pays to be succinct.

But Thompson -- suddenly -- is for tough border enforcement, but as with Romney, it's tough to believe he sincerely changed in a year.

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Compare Giulini, Romney, Thompson, and McCain with Newt's history on illegal immigration:

As Speaker, Newt supported legislation of Duncan Hunter's that eventually built a fence on the border near San Diego. He also, as he does now, wanted English as the official language of the United States.

In late 2005, the same Tancredo who trashed Thompson's immigration stance said that Gingrich had the best plan in the GOP besides himself.

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As with so many issues, the other Republican candidates are recent converts to the position Newt has held for many years.

The danger with that, of course, is what would stop them from flipping back to their previous position? Also, can they be trusted to see the next issue correctly if they could not see past ones like Newt did?

It's great that Fred Thompson now largely admits he made a mistake supporting the squelching of free speech as laid out in McCain-Feingold -- but if he can initially make such a horrible mistake, isn't it quite possible -- even likely -- he'll be wrong on future issues?

Newt Spending like a Candidate

Almost two months ago, it was revealed that Newt Gingrich's 527 group, American Solutions for Winning the Future, had hired a pollster and fundraiser.

Lately, it was revealed that the group also spent $136,000 in April for "travel, aides' salaries, advice from a preeminent Iowa political consultant and other expenses that seem a lot like those racked up by the presidential candidates," writes Politico.com.

In March, the group, among other expenses, spent $89,000 dollars on radio advertisements.

Since its establishment in October, the group -- which will, in the words of Newt spokesman Rick Tyler, "advance big ideas" -- has raised $2.2 million. That's more than all GOP Presidential candidates but the "big three": Giuliani, McCain, Romney.