NO LACK OF WORK TO DO. The Corner's Mark Krikorian wants the Administration to Do Something Else about immigration policy.

The president has met with John McCain about jump-starting the amnesty process in Congress and sent Colin Powell to buck Mexico with amnesty talk. What is the White House thinking? It is the height of irresponsibility to jeopardize the unique opportunity to reform the tax system and/or Social Security by wasting valuable political capital on this fool's errand.

Let me quote the President himself from the third debate. (I don't know if the link is still good, my extended references are here.)

President Bush: Many people are coming to this country for economic reasons. They're coming here to work. If you can make 50 cents in the heart of Mexico, for example, or make $5 here in America, $5.15, you're going to come here if you're worth your salt, if you want to put food on the table for your families. And that's what's happening.

And so in order to take pressure off the borders, in order to make the borders more secure, I believe there ought to be a temporary worker card that allows a willing worker and a willing employer to mate up, so long as there's not an American willing to do that job, to join up in order to be able to fulfill the employers' needs.

That has the benefit of making sure our employers aren't breaking the law as they try to fill their workforce needs. It makes sure that the people coming across the border are humanely treated, that they're not kept in the shadows of our society, that they're able to go back and forth to see their families. See, the card, it'll have a period of time attached to it.

It also means it takes pressure off the border. If somebody is coming here to work with a card, it means they're not going to have to sneak across the border. It means our border patrol will be more likely to be able to focus on doing their job.

There are still some archive troubles at Blogger, but there's much more about such a policy proposal here. News coverage here.