Chickened Out?

"Well, how come you say you will when you won't? Say you do, baby when you don't? Let me know, honey, how you feel. Tell the truth now, is love real?" Compared to Carl Perkins, Elvis was a punk. Knight-Ridder (07.26.05):

"Two of President Bush's Cabinet secretaries scrapped scheduled appearances Tuesday before a Senate hearing on overhauling immigration law, raising questions about the president's commitment to repairing the nation's immigration system. Senate Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., displayed frosty annoyance after Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao backed out of the committee's first major hearing this year to begin shaping an immigration bill." Two Bush Cabinet secretaries back out of Senate immigration hearing

Specter was pissed: "'We're going to do our work,' Specter said. 'When the administration wants to chime in, we'll be ready to listen.'" Chime in? "The administration no-shows baffled participants in the issue, since the administration has had more than a year and a half to fine-tune its positions on immigration. Bush first stressed the need for immigration reform in January 2004 by proposing a temporary immigrant guest-worker program, which has become a starting point for other proposals." They want the Latino vote, but they're nervous as hell about the "anti-immigration wing of the GOP" and the "echo chamber of conservative talk radio". Might this little conundrum be causing the Administration a good deal of consternation? Confusion too, perhaps? Tell the truth now, is love real?