With his Iraq policy under attack, President Bush tried to rally his base of support last week with tough talk on a totally different topic: immigration reform.

Unfortunately, none of the reforms touted by the president does anything to address the massive flow of illegal immigration.

In his speech, Bush once again called for a temporary worker program. But any such program is unlikely to draw participants if it doesn't offer some pathway to citizenship.

Bush has been steadfast against amnesty, saying it would be a mistake. But you can't have comprehensive immigration reform without it.

Granting amnesty may be one of the only ways to make a temporary guest worker program both appealing and effective. A good plan would take into account what an undocumented worker has already contributed to society.

Even if workers were required to go back to their homeland, a good temporary work program would allow people to go back and forth to America without fear of prosecution.

But that kind of plan would be tantamount to an open border. And though some conservatives have advocated for that, Bush's plan does not.

All the president's plan does is allow employers to hire foreign workers legally, something many of them manage to do already.

If the president really wanted to address real immigration reform, he'd forget the border and enforce existing labor laws.

He'd hire more workforce inspectors to address workplace safety, overtime and minimum-wage violations. That would reduce incentives for employers to hire and exploit unauthorized workers in the first place.