> doesn't his new immigration proposal lean pretty far left?

Bah! Just a political ploy to get hispanic votes during an election year. Hispanics, as a block, are actually pretty conservative; they are deeply religious and lean right on both social and economic causes.* Really the only reason they are associated with the Democrats is that the Republican party has been very anti-immigration (I don't think California's hispanics will ever forget the Republican backed proposition 187). This is a very clever plan to appeal to them, but this will never get by the Republicans in congress and Bush knows that. I doubt very highly he will push it at all to members of congress as a matter of fact, but then when it fails Bush can just say "Well, you can see I tried, I am a good guy, please vote for me". I don't buy it for a second.

* Before I get crucified again, I would like to point out that not all hispanics are any of the things I mentioned. it is a generalization based on polls and general feeling of the group as a whole, but it certainly does not apply to everyone within that group.