Informed Speculation

…is a motive. Why, pray tell, are Democrats and progressives constantly opposed to commonsense election reform, like electronic voter devices, or even something so incredibly basic and fundamental as requiring identification to vote? It’s not a head-scratcher – the Left has always played on the economic fears of the poor, and few are poorer than the newly arrived illegal immigrant.

Think I’m being unfair? Let’s turn it over to Francine Busby:

If an election can turn on a sentence, this could be the one: “You don’t need papers for voting.”

On Thursday night, Francine Busby, the Democratic candidate for the 50th Congressional District, was speaking before a largely Latino crowd in Escondido when she uttered those words. She said yesterday she simply misspoke.

But someone taped it and a recording began circulating yesterday. After she made that statement at the meeting, Busby immediately said: “You don’t need to be a registered voter to help (the campaign).”

She said that subsequent statement was to clarify what she meant.

The recording, which was played yesterday on Roger Hedgecock’s radio talk show, jolted the campaign.

Busby, a Cardiff school board member, is in a tight race with Republican Brian Bilbray, a congressman-turned-lobbyist, who has based his campaign on a tough anti-illegal-immigration stance. Busby has focused her campaign on ethics reform. The two are vying to replace Randy “Duke” Cunningham, who was jailed after pleading guilty to taking bribes.

Busby said she was invited to the forum at the Jocelyn Senior Center in Escondido by the leader of a local soccer league. Many of the 50 or so people there were Spanish speakers. Toward the end, a man in the audience asked in Spanish: “I want to help, but I don’t have papers.”

It was translated and Busby replied: “Everybody can help, yeah, absolutely, you can all help. You don’t need papers for voting, you don’t need to be a registered voter to help.”

Bilbray said at worst, Busby was encouraging someone to vote illegally. At best, she was encouraging someone who is illegally in the country to work on her campaign.

Now for the punchline:

“I was clarifying the question that was being asked in Spanish and then stated that you do not have to be a registered voter to help the campaign because there were many people who appeared to be to be under 18 in the group who wanted to volunteer,” she said in a statement. “I’m not surprised that the Republican Party is making this last-minute, desperate ploy and it is absolutely false.” 

Yes, in a campaign that may turn on illegal immigration, in California, a Spanish-speaking man says he wants to help, but he doesn’t have papers, and Busby assumes he meant because he was under 18.

Ummmmhmmmm…

Voting is a privilege, it’s not an entitlement. You play by the rules, or you don’t vote – what could be fairer than that?