Alot of "Amnesty Deal This Summer" Talk Portends What Exactly?

So, here is the lay of the land.  Obama is a lame duck, Democrats are looking extraordinarily weak going into campaign season for the midterm elections.  Republicans are riven internally into two camps on immigration, which for simplification purposes we'll call "pro-amnesty Hispanic outreach" vs. "why reward law-breaking, guaranteed future Democrat voters?"

Now we're hearing noises from both Republicans and Democrats that an "amnesty" type deal is coming.  We know that Democrats want to use immigration reform to get more Democratic voters.  Question:  Why would Republicans, facing better prospects after November, hand Obama and the Democrats a much desired victory that will hurt Republicans at the ballot box in the future?

Why indeed?  There are a few possibilities.

1) Republicans are titanically stupid.  This is a distinct possibility.

2) Republicans are calculating that doing a deal will blunt Hispanic turnout in November and allow them to claim they are "bi-partisan" and grab some street cred with Hispanics going into the midterms.  This is not much better than #1.

3) Republicans are acting cooperative and looking bi-partisan and pro-amnesty/immigration, but will run out the clock and be oh-so-miffed that they couldn't get something agreed to, but they tried.  This isn't all that smart, but it isn't criminally stupid either.

4) Republicans can maneuver Dems into a bad deal that blunts the Dems' play for more Dem voters but that gets Republicans credit for being pro-immigration.  This is smarter but implausible.

5)  Republicans are going to attempt to do a combo of 3 and 4 but ultimately wait until after November when they can do a much more favorable deal to position themselves well with Hispanics for 2016 but not have to hand Dems millions of new voters.  This is the smartest plan, and I hope is what all the talk is portending.  But I am not optimistic.