If being consistent and honest in what one says is a measure of respect, then John McCain must have a level of disrespect, somewhere between carelessness and contempt, for the American public.

We see this in his own self-refuting remarks about Hispanic voters, which make him sound like he is frivolously supporting amnesty without regard for the concerns and interests of American citizens.

"The Republican Party is losing the support of our Hispanic citizens and we realize that there are many issues on which we think we are in agreement with our Hispanic citizens but this [amnesty] is a preeminent issue with those citizens."  That's how McCain understood Hispanic voters in January.

Now, he admits that "[p]assing this bill would not give us a single vote, but it would put us on the playing field where we can compete."

McCain's gone from saying that amnesty is a "preeminent issue" for Hispanics to saying that amnesty will net the Republican Party nothing.  How could he be so wrong about something so fundamental?

McCain points to Arizona and Texas, claiming that it is a demographic certainty that in eight years or so, Hispanics will be a near-majority.  Not acting on this issue would "condemn ourselves to 15 to 20 percent" of that vote, he says.  He must have pulled that factoid from the same region where he pulled the "preeminent issue" rhetoric.

But let's assume that one potential outcome of rejecting amnesty is that Republicans get 20 percent of the Hispanic vote.  That outcome would be only 7% worse than what Romney did.

As Byron York has shown, using electoral models of the Hispanic vote, it is likely that the Republican Party would have had to win 73% of the Hispanic vote in 2012 in order to win the election.  Since no Republican in the modern era has received more than 40% of the Hispanic vote (the 44% for Bush in 2004 claimed by some Republicans is almost certainly wrong), there is no basis in logic or evidence to expect that the Hispanic vote is the key to victory or defeat.  

The actual numbers point to a "bonanza" for Democrats if amnesty passes.  Politico's incredible recent report describes the catastrophe for the GOP that would follow amnesty: Politico extrapolated the racial voting patterns from the 2012 election and applied those patterns to the theoretical 11 million illegal aliens.

"Key swing states that Obama fought tooth and nail to win -- like Florida, Colorado and Nevada -- would have been comfortably in his column," the report found.  Obama would have been very competitive in Georgia and would be "very close" to winning Arizona.

In Texas, Arizona, and Georgia, "[t]he total undocumented immigrant population in each of those states exceeds Romney's margin of victory," Politico noted.   

So we refuse to pass amnesty, and assume the GOP drops to 20% support.  How is that worse than admitting 11 million illegal aliens, and their immediate family members, with absolutely no limit?

It's possible that Latinos don't care as much about immigration policy as McCain wants them to.  According to a Pew Hispanic poll from October 2012, only a third of Hispanic registered voters believe that immigration policy is extremely important.  However, a polling firm called Latino Decisions recently gained attention for reporting that 44 percent of Latinos surveyed said they would be "more likely" to vote Republican if the GOP took a leadership role in passing amnesty.  On the other hand, 37 percent of Latinos would not care if the Republicans blocked amnesty.

In any discussion of Latino views of immigration, it should be noted that the pro-amnesty Latino Decisions poll was conducted in partnership with the SEIU and the National Council of La Raza (facts that ABC failed to report in a story on the poll).  That's not to say the poll is worthless -- the poll is just extremely biased.

It shouldn't matter which interest groups want us to disregard our sovereignty.  Nor should we care about the phony moral superiority proclaimed by pro-amnesty Republicans.  McCain and his ilk seem to enjoy being beholden to people who have broken our laws, but the rest of us don't have to be supine.

There will be nothing "comprehensive" about amnesty.  In the push for the 1986 amnesty law, Sen. Ted Kennedy proclaimed, "We will secure the borders henceforth. We will never again bring forward another amnesty bill like this."

McCain now praises Ted Kennedy's amnesty leadership in 1986.  Speaking of the prospects for passing amnesty today, McCain says, "If we do succeed, and I think we will, it will be a testimonial to Ted Kennedy's effort years ago that laid the groundwork for this agreement."  "You will find that this agreement has very little difference from that of the legislation that was led by Sen. Kennedy some years go."

So the 1986 amnesty, which Kennedy said would "never again" occur, was just McCain's "groundwork" for amnesty today.  McCain admits that there is "very little difference" between the current amnesty proposal and the 1986 amnesty, which was "never again" supposed to happen.

How can John McCain expect anyone to believe that he has the best interests of the country at heart?  What are we to think about how he views us?

It seems like a terrible risk to gamble with our nation's economic health for the sake of a "more likely" chance of getting Latino votes.  More importantly, amnesty is a test of our national self-respect.  No one has a right to break our laws and then demand that he be rewarded for doing so.

American citizenship should not be treated like every other piece of fetid Washington pork, to be passed around under tables and doled out for favors.

Instead, we should refuse to gamble away our sovereignty; we should reject amnesty, and uphold existing immigration law.