THE BORDER REPORT My column in The News of Mexico City

“Have you noticed,” said the political analyst as he drained his glass of wine, “how all these candidates have turned on illegal immigrants this year?”

“How’s that different from any other year?” I wondered.

“Are you kidding?” he says. “They are beating these people into the ground. Where’s the talk about guest-worker programs and hard workers? Nah man, it’s getting ugly.”

He laughed nastily. “But who cares? It’s not like they can vote anyway.”

I’ll admit, I was a bit skeptical. Trying to pin these people down on their views can be like trying to pinpoint one end of a rainbow. So, I checked.

In 2004, Pres. George Bush stood before the country and announced his backing of an immigration reform plan, one that would offer citizenship to Mexican nationals. The United States, he said, “should have immigration laws that work and make us proud. Yet today we do not."

Afterward, the administration took such a hit for that speech, once the fiery topic of every political Web site, newspaper editorial and radio show, that the vague idea faded away as if it had never been mentioned. Never again did the administration bring it up.

Three years later, the language of immigration reform has morphed into the militant language of “border security,” and now every aspirant to the White House has adopted the term.

I’ve been perusing OnTheIssues.org, to try and pin down where these candidates stand on immigration reform and overwhelmingly, the solutions from the front-runners are fencing to keep new illegal migrants out and punishment for those already here.

Here’s Rudy Giuliani on a radio ad released last summer in New Hampshire, Iowa and Washington, D.C.:

“People that come in illegally we gotta stop. You stop illegal immigration by building a fence, a physical fence and then a technological fence. You then hire enough Border Patrol so they can respond in a timely way."

Barack Obama in a November Democratic debate in Las Vegas:

“Employers have to be held accountable. When we do those things, we can take the illegal aliens who are here, get them out of the shadows, make sure that they are subject to a stiff penalty, make sure that they're learning English and go to the back of the line so they're not getting an advantage over people who came here legally.”

Hillary Clinton in a South Carolina Democratic debate last April:

“I'm in favor of comprehensive immigration reform, which includes tightening our border security, sanctioning employers who employ undocumented immigrants, getting the 12 million or so immigrants out of the shadows. That's very important to me. After 9/11, we've got to know who's in this country. And then giving them a chance to pay a fine, pay back taxes, learn English and stand in line to be eligible for a legal status in this country.”

In a November television ad airing in New Hampshire and Iowa, Republican Mitt Romney:

“As Governor, I authorized the State Police to enforce immigration laws. I opposed driver's licenses and in-state tuition for illegal aliens.

“As president, I'll oppose amnesty, cut funding for sanctuary cities and secure our borders.”

Very, very different from the tone taken in 2004. Here’s Bush again:

“Out of common sense and fairness, our laws should allow willing workers to enter our country and fill jobs that Americans are not filling.”

Let’s be very clear here, in the context of the presidential elections, illegal immigrants are not our friends.

The … finessed … solutions being offered up by this current crop of candidates are calculated to draw on the criticisms of illegal immigration (we need to know who’s in this country and we need to build fences to keep the new ones out) rather than the positives (hard-working people who do the jobs Americans won’t do).

Pres. Felipe Calderón went overboard last week when he ordered his foreign diplomats to spread a positive message about immigrants into the national conversation now abounding in this country.

“The only theme in this electoral campaign is to know who is the more macho … the most anti-Mexican,” he said.

That, of course, was mostly a message to his own constituents – but he wasn’t far off the money.

When you have Giuliani accusing Romney of hiring illegal immigrants, John Edwards fudging his answers to whether they should have driver’s licenses, and Clinton booed for not promising them a path to citizenship in her first 100 days, it’s easy to see that nobody wants to touch immigration in this campaign trail.

Instead, everybody is playing to the lowest card, going for the cheap and easy fixes. From Clinton to Romney and everybody in between, the solutions are higher fences and making the illegal migrants pay for being here.

It’s easy to see why the topic is approached in this way, I suppose. But I do wonder, if we’re going to vote for the best illegal immigration-basher, what’s that say about us?

-- Michael Marizco