Which means, compared to other Hispanics, Rubio has very little skin in the immigration game. His core constituency has a huge pass in immigration law, compared to other Latinos, because as soon as a Cuban sets foot on US soil, they’re refugees, not illegal immigrants. So when Josh Marshall notes that Rubio is slow-playing immigration reform so that it will be as bloodied up as possible once it gets through Congress, and perhaps be killed, the only risk that Rubio is taking, personally, is perhaps to his Presidential ambitions, because the only way his core constituents would be upset would be if they lost their privileged immigration status. Rubio has insulated himself against that possibility by becoming the chief Republican deal-maker. It’s a neat trick that’s not often remarked upon in the coverage of Rubio’s role in immigration reform.
Baud
No small thing IMHO.
peach flavored shampoo
Yes, but Average Joe doesn’t realize the diff, so a failure on his part here torpedoes this 2016 chances.
Yutsano
This may be true for the older Cubanos who are (still) waiting for Castro to die so they can go back to their privileged lives in Cuba, but the young’uns could give a shit about wet foot/dry foot. Rubio only won because he was in a three way race and Crist couldn’t get Sink to drop out and vice versa. If he were in a head-to-head match-up I doubt he’d have the job of Senator now. Not to mention a lot of his hijinks with the party in Florida are going strangely unexplored.
Biff Longbotham
Makes me wonder how many Americans today screaming about letting in all of those illegals, granting amnesty, blah blah etc., are the children or grandchildren of post WWII displaced persons from Europe.
c u n d gulag
You’ve got to love it, that Republicans think all people with a Latino/Hispanic heritage are pretty much the same.
And they assume that ALL of them will vote for either Rubio or Cruz because of their last names.
Pssssst…
No one clue them in on the fact that Cubans are not exactly the most beloved group in the American Latino/Hispanic world.
c u n d gulag
@Biff Longbotham:
I’m one of them, first generation and all of that, and I know a few like that.
But, you see, most of the people coming here after WWII were Caucasians, so THAT was ok.
Not like now…
feebog
@ Peach Colored Shampoo:
It doesn’t matter what the “Average Joe” thinks about Rubio’s Latino roots. What matters is how many Latino’s buy his bullshit. And frankly, all the Latino’s I know who are politically aware know the guy is a lightweight.
Gin & Tonic
@c u n d gulag: I’m in the same group. They justify it by saying “but they [parents, grandparents] came here legally.”
Chris
Even less than the average Cuban, since his family came to America before the Revolution and not after. He can’t even claim “I was driven out by the dirty Reds,” even though he’s tried to.
I see conservatives who promote Rubio as engaging in the age-old tradition of promoting a minority to show they’re not racist – which is to say, it’s not actually aimed at minorities, so much as it is at “moderate” whites who might have enough scruples that they don’t want to vote for a racist party, but will be satisfied by “us racist? We have black friends!” as an answer.
They haven’t yet figured out it’s not moderate white people they have to worry about anymore, but actual nonwhite voters – and the vast majority of them see the cheap tokenism for what it is.
GregB
@peach flavored shampoo:
But the average Juan and Juanita do. Which makes his slow walking efforts even more disgraceful.
Looking forward to the day when someone actually asks him this question to his face.
some guy
when Rubio’s parents came here they were illegal immigrants. this was before wet foot/dry foot. one would think that as a child of illegal immigrants he might have some empathy?
some guy
@Yutsano:
ion fact, Obama won the majority of Cuban voters in Florida in 2012. surprising, but true nonetheless
Omnes Omnibus
@some guy: Any support for the claim that Rubio’s parents were illegal immigrants? It is my understanding that the immigrated legally and eventually became citizens.
JPL
@some guy: haha.. Justice Thomas is against affirmative action also.
mistermix
@Baud: I don’t think that Rubio’s Presidential ambitions would be much affected by the failure of immigration reform. He’s not going to get the nomination by touting his reform credentials to the base.
peach flavored shampoo
@feebog: Trust me, I’m well-aware that Average Juan knows that Rubio is a phony, not a true Hispanic, and enjoys an immigration double-standard that’s patently absurd. Thats money in the bank. But most moderates are likely unaware of this, and so they’ll see his tanking the immigration bill as him throwing “his own” under the bus.
Baud
@mistermix:
Republican nominees like to have a “hook” that makes them seem moderate during the general campaign.
Romney: Worked with Mass. Democrats
McCain: Campaign finance reform
Bush: “Compassionate conservatism.”
Can’t remember before that. I think Rubio was counting on immigration to do that for him, plus to help with Hispanic voters. But maybe his calculus has changed.
Punchy
If Marc Rubio is Cuban, anyone know if Mark Cuban is a rube?
aimai
Does anyone really think that someone like Rubio is bucking for more than the second banana spot, VP, first time of asking? I mean, I know its said that every Senator gets up in the morning and sees a President looking back at him in the mirror while he shaves but if Rubio isn’t a great immigrant hope he isn’t going to win a general election, and if he is he is going to lose the republican primary. His best hope of raising himself to presidential politics is to serve to offer some cover on the immigration issue to a more standard republican candidate–like Sarah Palin tried to offer McCain some “cred” on some issues that she personified (i.e. the false assertion that having her in the white house would be ‘good for families with special needs children.’) In other words: if Rubio’s going to be a token he needs to shore up his token bonafides and “stand in” for something that the Republicans as a party need. They don’t need another asshole standing in for opposing immigrant rights. They need someone to soften their edges while still showing the mailed fist to their own supporters.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Baud:
Except that they’ve worked their base up to such a frenzy that even a hint of moderation during the primaries will undo a candidate. Tacking back toward center now gets a putative Republican nominee just about to the far right.
Baud
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
That was supposedly Romney’s dilemma, but he tacked right for the primary and then left for the general, and the base just went along with both lies. Maybe it’ll be different in 2016 without the Obama hate, though. We’ll see.
Chris
@c u n d gulag:
At the time, was it really? The fifties was the last decade where “Real America” was not just white, but WASP, and the crowd of non-Anglos from off the boat, even if they’d managed to carve out a place for themselves, were still viewed with a lot of suspicion (see also all the anti-Catholic stuff that was levied at Kennedy).
Nowadays that’s all been smoothed over in popular memory, of course.
Suffern ACE
@Baud: Romney tacked left for exactly o e debate performance. There was no follow through on that.
Baud
@Suffern ACE:
There didn’t need to be a follow through given today’s media.
Yutsano
@Baud: The follow through was: did BoBo get a tingly feeling up his leg? Teh Village went forward from that.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Chris:
My dad, a descendant of Czech immigrants, was born in a suburb of Cleveland in 1920. He often mentioned that while he was growing up non-WASPs were routinely referred to as Hunkies, Guineas, or Wops.
Baud
@Yutsano:
The polls are skewed! It’s a horse race — either one could win!
Fuckers.
rikyrah
been saying he was a fraud from the get go.
Violet
Speaking of Cuba, the wingnut meltdown over Beyonce and Jay-Z visiting Cuba has been interesting to watch. Somehow I don’t think that if Kelsey Grammer and his newest wife (or pick another wingnut celeb) visited Cuba there would be quite the same outrage.
SatanicPanic
Why are you trying divide Latinos?
Liberals are the real racists.
aimai
@Chris:
Not to mention the fact that the US famously refused entry to Jews during the war–even turning boatloads away. Refugees after the war, if that means Jews, have remained very clear on the necessity for expanded immigration and generally support immigrant rights in memory of the struggles of their grandparents and great grandparents.
CDW
This might keep Rubio from winning in 2016, but I doubt that it will keep him or any of the other likely republican contenders from running. I’m hoping the 2016 republican primaries and general election race will be as entertaining as 2012.
reflectionephemeral
@feebog:
Republicans don’t know that– they think that to win Hispanic votes they need to learn how to translate phrases like “makers vs. takers” and “death panels” into Spanish. So this plays well with all the folks who can help Rubio in his party.
Of course you’re right– this does zero for Rubio or the GOP in the wider world. (Maybe some “undecideds” (read: “low-information voters”) will be impressed, for some reason, but not many, and the blowback would probably counterbalance it anyway).
Pococurante
I had forgotten this. Age…
It explains why some many Cuban-Americans oppose lifting the blockade and a reminder of the blatant unfairness of the blockade policy:
@Gin & Tonic: And when restrictions were almost non-existent.
Snarki, child of Loki
All one has to do to wrong-foot Rubio is ask him in a public forum:
“how about we give ALL immigrants the same deal that the CUBANS get?”
and just watch the sputtering and squirming.
Another Halocene Human
@Yutsano: Not to mention a lot of his hijinks with the party in Florida are going strangely unexplored.
Gee, you mean the state GOP can’t police itself? And the rump Florida Democratic Party is a disorganized grifterscape?
Whatever tipped you off? ///
Kyle
Anecdotally, the Hispanics in California, mostly of Mexican origin, don’t see Rubio as one of their own, even aside from his noxious politics. Cubans seem to be disliked as arrogant by people of Mexican and Central American origin. They don’t give a crap about Castro-expropriation sob stories because their forebears never had much to begin with.
So if the GOP proudly-ignorant parochials think “He’s brown, so all the browns will vote for him”, they’re in for a surprise.