Lesson of the Week: Think Before You Speak

Every candidate in a political race of any form must remember to think carefully of what they say. This is particularly very hard to do in political parties because one must remember that what might be good for their pursuits of the primary, might be what ruins their chances in the general election. In other words, often times a candidate's efforts to win their party's approval over during the primaries has the potential to backfire on them once they win their parties nomination and are running for president because now they have to appeal to everyone across the political spectrum. Therefore, what might appeal to their political party might not appeal to the general public.

In this years Republican Primaries, there have been plenty of mistakes made by numerous candidates that might result in one winning the primary, but might make Obama's road to re-election a little easier. Three of the strongest candidates have said things that will likely result in a lack of support from the growing Latino community. Rick Perry whose past as we know has contributed to his loss of public support, brought up a story about Romney that was leaked to the press in 2006. In this story, Romney was said to had unknowingly hired undocumented workers to mow his lawn. When he realized that they did not hold green cards, he went to the company and said "I'm running for office, for Pete's sake, I can't have illegals." Herman Cain who has been surging in the polls to many people's surprise has also made remarks that most likely creates tension between him and the Latino community. Cain said which he later referred to as a joke that if he were elected he would put an electrified fence with barbed wire on the U.S.-Mexico border that would kill people if they tried to come across. Michele Bachmann has also acknowledged that she would build a double fence to make it harder for people to illegally cross the border. In this time of economic dismay, she has made this issue number one on her priority list and has been subject to accusations of racism.

Hispanics are America's fastest growing minority group in America, who accounted for 47% of both Texas and California's population in 2009. Between both of these states, there are 89 electoral votes to be won. Although it is a norm in the Republican Party to take a hard stance on illegal immigration, controversial comments such as the ones that were recently made can possibly come back to haunt them once they are up against Barrack Obama, who gained 67% of the Latino vote in 2008. Another slip up on this issue by not just these three candidates, during the last Republican debate in Las Vegas, not one of the candidates mentioned that illegal immigration has a much wider spectrum than those who cross the  Mexican border into our country. These comments have made Obama's seemingly uphill battle towards re-election look a little less steep. Most likely, one of these three candidates will wind up winning the Republican nomination, and it will be very hard for any of them to salvage their reputation within the Latino community after their remarks.

Links used:

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2011/10/romney-explains-record-of-hiring-illegal-immigrants-as-lawn-keepers/

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/17/us/politics/on-taxes-and-fences-herman-cain-stumbles-a-bit.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/15/michele-bachmann-border-fence-immigration-perry_n_1012833.html

http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1024/exit-poll-analysis-hispanics

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/hhmcensus1.html

http://www.fec.gov/pages/elecvote.htm