Our guest blogger is David Halperin of the Israel Policy Forum.

The biggest challenge to U.S. diplomacy today is just showing up. U.S. Ambassadors in Syria, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkmenistan (and the Czech Republic too) are all missing — held up in Congress or in transition. In total, an area of over 700,000 square miles — and over 120 million people — is without official U.S. representation. Especially unhelpful is Republican opposition to ambassadors to Syria and Turkey, two strategically critical nations with significant influence in areas where U.S. national security interests are at stake.

The U.S. Ambassador post in Damascus has been vacant since February 2005, following the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. In February, the White House nominated Robert Ford, a career diplomat with vast experience in the region, to fill the post.

But Republican senators have since stood in the way, arguing in a letter to Secretary Clinton that “Engagement of hostile regimes in pursuit of U.S. interests is not necessarily bad policy, if it is part of a realistic strategy with measurable goals. But engagement for engagement’s sake is not productive. However well-justified that engagement is the U.S. pays a price for lending even a modicum of international legitimacy to a regime like Syria’s.”

Even without an ambassador in Damascus, the Obama administration has sought to engage Syria in an effort to ameliorate its behavior vis a vis Lebanon and Iraq, as well as advance the prospects for renewed Israel-Syria peace talks. But the obstacles to advancing U.S. interests without an ambassador will be difficult to overcome.

The highest U.S. representation in Syria today is the charge d’affaires, whose access to senior Syrian officials is limited. As Jim Walker wrote in a recent op-ed in The Hill, “while the U.S. chargé d’affaires cannot meet the Syrian foreign minister or president — unless accompanied by a visiting Special Envoy or Congressional delegations — Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have free access to the ears of President Basher Assad and his government.”

To be sure, the Republicans opposed to the nominee have reason to be concerned about Syria’s behavior. But an ambassador in Damascus will serve to advance US interests, not reward bad deeds.

Unlike with Syria, where Republicans are opposed to the mere concept of an ambassador, when it comes to Turkey, outgoing Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) is opposed to the specific nominee, Francis J. Ricciardone, Jr. Or at least that is what he claims. Read more

Our guest bloggers are Center for American Progress Senior Vice President Araceli Ruano and Green Opportunity Research Associate Jorge Madrid.

The forces behind Proposition 23 are hiding a lot of dirty secrets. Not only are they attempting to effectively repeal California’s iconic environmental protection laws, they are also funding a national campaign against immigrants, and collaborating with anti-immigrant extremist groups:

Koch Industries – One of the biggest polluters in the country and by no coincidence the nation’s biggest spender on dirty energy lobbying. In addition to pushing Prop 23, they are also financing the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) — a powerful front group that helped Arizona lawmakers craft the notorious SB 1070 law. SB 1070 essentially legalizes racial profiling against suspected immigrants, especially against Latinos and other people of color. The Koch-funded group aims to promote Arizona “copy-cat” laws around the country.

Assemblyman Dan Logue (R- Chico) – The California lawmaker who introduced Prop 23 and called climate change “a scam” is also an infamous anti-immigrant voice. Last year, he paid large sums of campaign money to Jim Gilchrist, the founder of the Minuteman Project, an extremist anti-immigrant vigilante group. Also, while campaigning for his assembly seat, he regularly made appearances with Chris Simcox, president of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps – whose hallmark speeches included racially charged rants against immigrants.

It also should be noted that Mr. Logue is in league with the Texas oil companies who are sponsoring prop 23. For the last several years, the Assemblyman accepted large donations from Valero, even though the oil company has no operations in Logue’s northern California district.

The Tea Party – California members of the fringe political group have recently taken up the Prop 23 cause, and are rallying for support. The Tea Party has been a strong supporter of Arizona’s draconian anti-immigrant laws, with one party rally championing Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, known for his extreme approaches to intimidate and humiliate immigrants. It should be no surprise that this radical group supports Prop 23; they are yet another front organization being bankrolled by Koch Industries.

Prop 23 adds insult to injury. Immigrant groups, especially Latinos, are disproportionately harmed by greenhouse gases and toxic emissions. One in six Latinos has been diagnosed with asthma in California, and Latinos also comprise 60 percent of the people living within a half mile of the top 100 emitters of toxic pollutants in places like Los Angeles County. Add to this the increased cases of cancer, birth defects, and hospitalizations – dirty energy is a death trap for these communities.

The recession has hit the construction and manufacturing sectors particularly hard, and many Latinos, including recent immigrants, have historically found work and gained access to wealth building and the middle class in these sectors. Proposition 23 would destroy half a million jobs in California (many in construction and high-tech manufacturing). Conversely, a new study has indicated that from 1995 to 2008, manufacturing employment in core green economy expanded by 19 percent, while there was a nine percent drop in total manufacturing employment.

When we connect the dots, it becomes clear that supporters of Prop 23 care little, if at all, for the environment, immigrants and Latino communities. Even worse, it appears these groups feel they can use immigrants, particularly Latinos, as their political ‘whipping boy’ in order to garner votes from conservatives and opponents of reasonable immigration reform.

This strategy should be great cause for concern. In the fight against climate change, Latinos and immigrants are a strong ally. Latinos make up about 20 percent of the electorate and 37 percent of the population in California. Polls have shown that Latino voters don’t accept the false choice between the economy and the environment. Latinos are the most likely racial/ethnic group to consider regional air pollution a big problem, as well as the most likely group that considers the effects of global warming is already happening.

The supporters of Prop 23 and their dirty money are attacking immigrants and Latinos from all directions — they should be exposed for their unconscionable agendas.

This week, the National Organization for Marriage is launching a 200,000 Spanish-language television ad campaign that aims to present senatorial candidate Carly Fiorina (R-CA) as the candidate who shares the values of Latino voters. One of the ads makes the point that Boxer “voted against immigration reform to permit our people to come here legally to work.” The narrator then concludes “We’ve had enough of her talk. Carly Fiorina for US Senate. Our values. Our senator.”

Watch it:

Meanwhile, Fiorina says “now is not the time” to deal with the millions of immigrants who are already in the country illegally. Instead, she supports SB-1070 and instituting a temporary worker program.

The National Organization for Marriage doesn’t explain why Boxer voted against immigration reform in 2007. The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007 would’ve provided millions of undocumented immigrants with a path to citizenship, but it was also plagued by several troubling provisions.

To begin with, just to regularize their immigration status, undocumented immigrants would’ve had to leave their jobs and families and return to their home countries for a period of time. Many agreed that the “touchback” requirement would likely lead to millions of undocumented immigrants staying underground. At the time, the Democratic Strategist wrote “Democrats are restless about the implications of voting for an increasingly bad bill ‘to keep the process going,’ counting on the House to pass something more acceptable.”

The touchback program wasn’t the only troubling part of the bill. The legislation also introduced a “point system” which would’ve sorted out lower-skilled immigrants from high-skilled ones and prioritized the latter in the allocation of visas with little to no regard for economic demand for workers or family reunification. The provision represented a “radical shift in the philosophy of the U.S. immigration system” and would’ve fundamentally changed the demographics of U.S. immigration in a way that probably would not have favored Latinos and their families. Then Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) called it a “radical experiment in social engineering.”

Finally, the bill included a controversial temporary worker program which Boxer herself claims would’ve amounted to “indentured servitude.” At the time, Boxer denounced the guest worker program, saying it would create a pool of “desperate low-wage workers” whom employers could easily exploit. Many of the nation’s unions agreed.

Boxer did vote in support of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006 which did not include a point system and contained a scaled-back touchback requirement and temporary worker program. She continues to support comprehensive immigration reform that includes a practical path to legalization and a “humane” temporary worker program.

The National Organization for Marriage’s ad also hits Boxer for being pro-choice and supporting same sex marriage. However, the California Latino population is itself split in its views on abortion and gay marriage.