On his radio show this afternoon, shock jock Rush Limbaugh wondered why Latino groups are “lobbying” for the health care bill if “illegal immigrants” aren’t covered:

“If illegal aliens are not going to get Obamacare — and he’s been telling everybody that this week — why are the following groups lobbying for Obamacare via Health Care for America Now?…Here are the groups: The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the National Council of La Raza — by the way, La Raza the steering committee for Health Care for America Now, The National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health — I’m sorry, the National Latina Institute for tax-payer funded abortion. If illegal immigrants aren’t going to get Obamacare, how come all of these Hispanic groups are lobbying for it?“

Listen:

It may come as a surprise to Limbaugh that not all Latinos are “illegal immigrants.” In fact, most Latinos have been here for generations and many are legal immigrants. Organizations like “La Raza,” LULAC, and others support health care reform because — despite explicitly excluding undocumented immigrants — they know it will benefit many in the Latino community who will be eligible to receive its benefits.

In response to Limbaugh’s comments, LULAC National President Rosa Rosales said:

“We want Rush Limbaugh to stop the lies about credible Hispanic civil rights organizations…If he had engaged in dialogue with us or read the proposed legislation he would have known and not falsified the facts. Limbaugh has insulted the largest and oldest Hispanic civil rights organization in the country.”

According to experts, one in three Latinos does not have health insurance.

Today, NumbersUSA’s Jennifer Magyari posted a video entitled “Grassroots America” which Magyari claims “explains the importance of taking a stand [on immigration] and forcing our Congressmen to listen to our opinions.” The video also features Mariann Davies, member of “You Don’t Speak for Me!,” saying that the idea that anyone who opposes immigration is a “racist” or a “nativist” is “simply not the case.”

That may be true, but the rest of the video’s speakers aren’t exactly the best spokespersons to prove her point. To begin with, the video was posted by NumbersUSA — an organization which the Southern Poverty Law Center describes as the “leading immigration-restriction group” whose Executive Director Roy Beck’s “close ties to a key nativist raise questions.” Beck is said to have worked and vacationed with eugenacist John Tanton, edited a book by white supremacist Wayne Lutton, and been referred to by Tanton as his “heir apparent.” If that’s not enough, Davies’ own group was organized by the president of a designated hate group, Dan Stein of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). Both Beck and Stein are also featured in the “Grassroots America” video.

Davies’ argument is also weakened by John O’Sullivan — a conservative journalist who the Cato Institute describes as part of the “anti-immigrant crusaders” who “hijack legitimate concerns about security to advance their pet political cause [reduced immigration].” Davies claims that her colleagues aren’t nativists, but in “Grassroots America” O’Sullivan decides to attack bilingualism:

“I talked to people about the language issue. How it was that bilingualism was spreading everywhere, bilingual education programs were being increasingly adopted. The more people I spoke to, the more I became convinced that this was important, but also mistaken.”

In a separate clip, Spanish-speaking Cuban-American “activist” Roan Garcia-Quintana also stated:

“It’s overwhelming — the people that testify for doing something to stop the illegal alien invasion are average citizens who all they care is to protect our heritage, our American culture, our way of life, and our language and not have all this new poverty — what I call 21st century slavery — be imposed upon us.”

Garcia-Quintana has made a point of making sure people know that his “family’s roots are in Spain,” and has described Mexican and Central American immigrants as “Indo-Hispanics” who “impose” their culture on him.

Stein wraps the video up with some harsh words of warning:

“Nobody has the right to force their way into my home. Nobody has the right to force their way into my country. And millions and millions of Americans all across this nation believe it too. And they’re not going to take this lying down.”

Watch it:

Yesterday Afghanistan conducted its second presidential election since the fall of the Taliban in 2001. While we won’t know the official results for a couple weeks — despite frontrunners, incumbent Hamid Karzai and challenger Abdullah Abdullah, both claiming victory — the reports about the voting that are coming out provide some important indicators on the state of Afghanistan today.

First, despite fears of widespread disruption by the Taliban and other militants, voting did occur. While there was violence across the country — nine civilians and 18 Afghan security force members were killed — the Taliban generally failed to follow through on threats to attack polling stations. Nevertheless, these threats did appear to suppress turnout in the violent south of the country. In Garmser district, where recently deployed U.S. Marines have been fighting the Taliban for almost two months, only 1,683 men voted out of a population of 80,000. Even Kabul had low turnout, though reports indicate that the capital’s low turnout was more due to disillusionment with the government than militant threats.

Second, there’s a real effort on the part of the international coalition to manage expectations. Special Representative Richard Holbrooke noted that “every prediction of disaster has turned out to be wrong” and “it seems clear that the Taliban utterly failed to disrupt these elections.” Marines on the ground in the town of Khan Neshin expressed surprise that the 250 to 300 people who voted did so at all. The local battalion commander “didn’t think we’d even get 10 people, to be honest with you, because of the intimidation campaign.”

Finally, the legitimacy of the vote is questionable. Most notably, female turnout appears to have been low across the country. There are two interrelated issues to be concerned about here: first is the effective disenfranchisement of Afghan women, which is in and of itself enough to delegitimize an election in the eyes of the international community. But this disenfranchisement leaves the door wide open for fraud — there are suspicions that registered female voters, both real and fictitious, will be used to stuff ballot boxes. The fact that voter registration cards were on sale for $10 a piece before the election further heightens suspicious of fraud. (Even Britney Spears managed to get registered to vote in Afghanistan.) A close election possibly decided by fraud only two months after a fraudulent election next door in Iran is a recipe for instability. Add the possibility of a run-off and the United States and NATO are looking at a precarious couple of weeks in Afghanistan.

So far, the U.S. has been right to manage expectations and emphasize the established election process in Afghanistan. But as Holbrooke stated, “The test is going to be in the counting.” If there is instability resulting from the official election results, the United States should continue to emphasize the primacy of the process without favoring one candidate or another. The elections process may slow down the counterinsurgency campaign by holding the Afghan government in stasis, but it is simply something that needs to be plowed through with an eye toward the legitimacy of the future government.