I can't even wrap my head around this piece of news via Gabo Pagán. I mean, seriously, how stupid does the GOP think Latinos? Absurdly Premature 2012 Watch, Vol. 2: The Governor of Puerto Rico ... for President? - The Gaggle Blog - Newsweek.com

A party whose base is animated in part by its opposition to illegal immigration is probably not going to "import" someone, as it were, for the biggest job in the land. But in the age of Obama, the GOP is suffering from a serious dearth of credible minority leaders—people who can speak with authority to an increasingly multiethnic electorate. And the shortfall is especially glaring in regard to Latinos, who are the country's fastest-growing minority group (they represented 7.4 percent of the electorate in 2008, up from 6 percent in 2004 and 5.4 percent in 2000) but are trending heavily Democratic, despite their religious, family-first leanings (George W. Bush took 44 percent of the Latino vote in 2004 versus only 31 percent for John McCain in 2008).

This is where Fortuño comes in. For Republicans, using Fortuño to fuel the eternal flame of 2012 speculation serves to make the GOP seem, at least, like a more welcoming place for Latinos—however whimsical his chances of reaching the White House currently are.

The stupidity ... it burns.

First off: From where did they pull the 17,000 new jobs created? Fortuño laid-off a total of 23,000 people many of them gray collar workers like teachers, managers, secretaries, accountants. Many of the stimulus jobs are NOT in that realm collar jobs. As per the quote Christian Science Monitor article, In Puerto Rico, school bathroom repairs, road rebuilding, and public housing renovation are among the key job-drivers.

We have basically 23,000 working middle class workers thrown out of government jobs. A fraction of them are back at work through contracts at a fraction of their rate and with no benefits. Most stimulus work is blue collar, which is fine, but it explains why we still have 17% unemployment in the island.

Luis Fortuño is not a saviour of the island. At all.

And we're talking here of a guy who got egg on his face because his own supporters hate him for pulling a bait and switch on them. Puerto Rico is not a republican heaven and Fortuño only won because he had promised not to lay-offgovernment workers.

Let me quote my own article over Newsweek's The Root:

First, a bit of background: Former Gov. Aníbal Acevedo Vilá had very little political capital left by 2008. When he won in 2004, he was certified by the courts after a slew of lawsuits tried to throw out his slim margin. Four years of hostilities with the assembly reached their peak with the 2008 government shutdown. Last, capitalizing on that bad faith, the opposition party brought trumped-up corruption charges against him just in time for the elections. The charges were used mercilessly against him throughout the campaign. Acevedo Vilá, a Democrat, was found innocent, but he nevertheless lost the elections to Luis Fortuño, his Republican opponent.

Fortuño won by a massive margin. He had pledge during his campaign to never let a shutdown happen or allow any massive layoffs. In the United States, for a Republican to make such campaign promises seems like an oxymoron. It's understandable in an island where the single largest employer is the government.

Elections are all about money and this is definitely a rather desperate attempt by the GOP to get themselves some of that white-looking colored money. Because, let's make no mistake, had Opus Deist Fortuño looked more Cleveland Brown than Milhouse Van Houten we wouldn't have this politico-hallucinogenic induced conversation.

What this says about the GOP is way more than what they expected it to be. Puerto Rican GOPers gave the world Michael Steele. Yes, it's was the brownies, all the US territories, voting in a block that gave Michael Steele the chairmanship of the GOP.

Which says to me that Grover Norquist (the guy quoted as hyping Fortuño) not only knows something about the internecine war within the GOP but that he's taking sides. And that side seems to be Michael Steele's camp?

Boggles the mind.