Last week, Colorado state Sen. Kent Lambert (R) introduced an Arizona copycat immigration bill. Last night, in an interview with CNN’s John King, Lambert defended his proposed legislation and denied that the GOP will face any substantial political implications for being the party behind the vicious anti-immigrant legislation that is being proposed throughout the nation:

KING: Senator, do you worry at all about the long-term prospects for the Republican Party? The political implications of this? I understand you stand by your law on principle. You believe it’s the right thing to do, but your state now has a 21 percent, 20.3 percent of Colorado’s population is Latino. You know the demographic growth. Not just in your state, but across the United States. Do you have any concerns, it’s essentially the Karl Rove question on immigration, that you will do generational damage to the Republican Party by pushing these proposals?

LAMBERT: Well, again, I think that’s really naive. We’ve seen the polling in Arizona, where Arizona 1070 was passed. It was passed on a wide bipartisan basis. The people, the Republicans, Democrats, Independents, and Hispanic, more than 50 percent of them all support Arizona bill 1070. Also, Jan Brewer, the governor, won by a landslide after signing that legislation. So the people of the United States want this law.

Certainly, I think the man on the street in Colorado wants to see, first of all, enforcement of our borders. Second, we want to enforce the current laws that we have on the books. Right now the federal government’s not doing that, and it’s time for the states, as many states are doing right now, take on the responsibility that they have for enforcing the law.

Watch it:

Lambert may think it’s naive, but not all of his Republican colleagues agree. It is naive to assume that the 2011 Inaugural Conference of the conservative Hispanic Leadership Network wasn’t in part an attempt by some Republicans to improve their party’s image amongst Latinos after the highly charged debate that Arizona’s immigration law sparked last year. Alfonso Aguilar, a conference participant and the executive director of the Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, told NPR: “Latinos are inherently conservative: They’re socially conservative; they are entrepreneurial; they’re pro-business. Immigration…is that one issue that prevents us from winning the support of Latino voters.” Former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-FL) proclaimed, “it would be incredibly stupid over the long haul to ignore the burgeoning Hispanic vote.”

Lambert seems to be ignoring the fact that an overwhelming majority of Latinos oppose laws like SB-1070, and, as the years pass by, it’s increasingly likely that the “man on the street in Colorado” is going to be Latino. Half of the U.S.’ population growth has been driven by the Latino population. 15.5 million Latinos are U.S. citizens who are currently too young to vote and many Latinos are legal immigrants who may one day become naturalized citizens.

The likelihood of Lambert’s law passing is still unclear. Unlike Arizona’s law it allows (rather than requires) local law enforcement officers to arrest someone if they have probable cause the person is an undocumented immigrant. Don Christensen, director of the County Sheriffs of Colorado, has said that Colorado sheriffs don’t want to enforce federal immigration law and cherish discretion when deciding whether to make an arrest.

Meanwhile, back in November, prominent Colorado Republican Steve Schuck slammed Lambert’s plan to introduce an Arizona-style immigration bill in his state. “Making headlines by coming out of the chute with an immigration bill as our initial, signature effort appears to evidence some serious tone deafness,” wrote Schucklan. “[E]verything, absolutely everything, should be subordinated to rebuilding the economy and we repubs should own the issue.”

The Tea Party has come to town and is excitedly proposing to cut everything under the sun – from Social Security to Medicare – and of course the item that always blows a huge hole in the budget: foreign aid. And by huge hole, I mean the one that accounts for just 0.015 percent of the total federal budget — an amount so small it makes the United States the most miserly aid provider of any developed country per capita. 165 House Republicans have now endorsed defunding USAID. Josh Rogin of Foreign Policy reports that the Republican Study Committee, which is made up of 165 conservative Republicans, unveiled a plan that:

calls for $1.39 billion in annual savings from USAID. The USAID operating budget for fiscal 2010 was approximately $1.65 billion.

If enacted, this bill would all but defund USAID, the agency responsible for administering foreign aid. To make the proposal even more ludicrous, the Republican plan, according to Republican development expert Connie Veillette of the Center for Global Development:

does not really cut foreign assistance, which is the presumable target. Instead, it cuts USAID’s ability to manage already appropriated funds.

If enacted, this would only create administrative chaos — a fact that demonstrates how little thought is going into Republican proposals. But the Republican eagerness at cutting the agency points to the broader question of whether they actually want the United States to remain a superpower because the current proposal might as well have been written by Hu Jintao.

Besides the moral importance of significantly helping people in need by providing food assistance and basic health provisions, foreign aid is critical to US foreign policy. Ensuring people aren’t starving and finding ways to kick start development in the impoverished parts of the world is essential to maintaining stability. From a geopolitical perspective, aid buys influence in countries and regions. The massive economic growth in China has led them to drastically increase the amount of aid they send abroad. China’s influence is now growing not only in their region, but in Africa and Latin America where Chinese development and investment projects are buying influence and even propping up odious regimes, leading some to refer to it as a “rogue donor.”

But this isn’t just about China. Foreign assistance is also critical to our hard national security objectives. In an interview with Foreign Policy, the head of USAID Rajeev Shah noted that the cuts would:

puts our national security in real jeopardy because we are working hand and glove with our military to keep us safe.

Following the calamity in Iraq and the struggles in Afghanistan the military saw first hand the importance of civilian assistance programs and have become outspoken proponents of them. But they have also been shocked at the lack of capacity at State and USAID to actually deliver on their stated missions. Gates and the Pentagon, unlike House Republicans, recognize USAID’s importance, as it is on the ground working in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, and the Horn of Africa — areas all critical to our military and our national security.

But these agencies continue to lack the resources to adequately do what is asked of them. This has prompted Secretary Gates to call for increases to the budgets of State and USAID and has noted that when he first left government in 1993 there were about 15,000 USAID workers that were deployable, now there are just 3,000. During this 15 year period, Republicans — particularly during the 90s under the leadership of former Senator Jesse Helms (R-NC) — significantly cut foreign aid and the State Department’s budget. This has gutted these agencies capabilities and has made them less able to adequately support efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as the US foreign policy objectives overall.

So the question for House Republicans is do they want the US to be a superpower that remains the most important and influential actor abroad or do they want to facilitate the rapid erosion of US hegemony? They would no doubt say the former, but in reality, their proposal results in the latter and is exactly how America declines as a great power. The effects of budget cuts like these don’t have immediate impact on our global status, but in the near term, 5, 10, and 15 years they serve to gradually, but in the end significantly, erode our influence and importance abroad.