CARAVAN heading to The U.S.A ( POLL )

[HarryStotle]

I may even invite the “well-vetted” ones inside.

…
Again, stop getting angry at people petitioning for asylum. It’s not illegal, and rest assured that with this country’s bigoted administration, they’ll turn these people away, and you’ll get your way about a country in which you don’t even live.

So why are you not a “bigot” for turning away the non “well-vetted” ones?

I mean besides the fact that you have a difference of opinion with the “bigoted administration” about who and how many should count as “well-vetted?”

My guess is that you and Trump would pretty much align regarding those whom you would allow into your house. It’s just that you appear to need some justification for maligning the “bigoted administration.”

Would you allow drug smugglers, rapists, or MS-13 members, into your house?

Would you allow a caravan of 30, 40 or 100 into your house where a few in that caravan could be or are drug smugglers, rapists, or MS-13 members?

Extrapolate from your house to the country, and explain to me, a foreign observer trying to understand the perplexing issue of why you claim to disagree with the “bigoted administration,” when you wouldn’t, ceteris parabus, act any differently if a smaller scale situation came to pass on your own street?

My understanding is that upwards of 94% of any claiming asylum are permitted to enter the country and remain for years before their status is judicially determined.

That would mean, if a hundred non-vetted asylum seekers showed up at your door, you would need to permit at least 94 of those to enter and have free access to your home for years before you would actually “vet” them. Would you accept those terms, or will you as an “UNbigoted administrator” relative to your home, simply let in the 94+ asylum seekers knowing only that they seek asylum, and nothing more?

So, apples to apples, why is the “bigoted administration” acting in a bigoted manner when refusing to be flooded by thousands of so-called “asylum seekers,” but you would not be if you exercised prudential judgement in not permitting a flood of 94 asylum seekers into your own home?

As for “stop getting angry,” why are you assuming anger on my part? Perhaps you are projecting your own emotional turmoil? I am a largely unaffected observer, remember, seeking to understand why your country seems so divided over what appears to be an easily decided issue.

 

[HarryStotle]

The Church needs to stop finger-wagging and start helping. If every parish sponsored one family of immigrants, we wouldn’t have a problem.

Our parish has sponsored three Syrian refuges families in the past two years, and has taken up the slack where the government failed to do its part with a family from Africa.

Speaking of “finger-wagging,” perhaps you need to not presume what you don’t know before bringing out the finger?

Most intelligent people are concerned about precedent, and wonder whether promoting large scale migration from underdeveloped countries to more developed countries is a wise long-term strategy.

It certainly doesn’t do anything to help the home countries of the economic migrants because it functions to empty those countries of potentially valuable, industrious and tenacious individuals.

This is the problem with letting momentous emotional heart-tugs determine policy rather than approaching serious problems with long-term solutions in mind.

Is there real concern for the people in the countries of origin, or mere concern for bolstering political agendas?

 

[Augustinian]

It certainly doesn’t do anything to help the home countries of the economic migrants because it functions to empty those countries of potentially valuable, industrious and tenacious individuals.

Exactly right. If Honduras is sending their best citizens to the US to be illegal aliens, how does that really help those who want to make Honduras great again?

 

[pnewton]

Would you allow drug smugglers, rapists, or MS-13 members, into your house?

Would you allow a caravan of 30, 40 or 100 into your house where a few in that caravan could be or are drug smugglers, rapists, or MS-13 members?

I do not think the rhetoric of fear and hate will persuade many, especially those who understand how this sort of characterization has played out through history. Of all the reasons for limiting immigration, the caricature of the “evil illegal” should not be one of them.

Dehumanizing whole groups of people is not right and we should flee this sort of talk.

 

[HarryStotle]

HarryStotle:

Would you allow drug smugglers, rapists, or MS-13 members, into your house?

Would you allow a caravan of 30, 40 or 100 into your house where a few in that caravan could be or are drug smugglers, rapists, or MS-13 members?

I do not think the rhetoric of fear and hate will persuade many, especially those who understand how this sort of characterization has played out through history. Of all the reasons for limiting immigration, the caricature of the “evil illegal” should not be one of them.

Dehumanizing whole groups of people is not right and we should flee this sort of talk.

Except, that is why I tried to reframe the context in terms that are more prudential and local. Having thousands of people from other countries decide to impose themselves on targeted countries that they have unilaterally decided ought to welcome them is rather unusual in its audacity, and should be just a bit worrisome considering the current political situation.

No one need see this as dehumanizing. In fact, to assume that people from other countries, even developing ones, ought not take responsibility for their own nation and situation is to infantilize them, which is a kind of “dehumanizing” precisely because morally responsible human beings are depicted as incapable of solving their own problems in their own for themselves.

 

[mythbuster1]

I wasn’t talking to you. I was talking to the bishops who lecture the US Government on treatment of refugees but won’t lift a finger to help the refugees themselves.

 

[pnewton]

I was talking to the bishops who lecture the US Government on treatment of refugees but won’t lift a finger to help the refugees themselves.

A mythbuster who perpetuates myths? You think there are bishops that won’t lift a finger to help a refugee himself? I find that absolutely crazy. I only know two, the president and vice president of the USCCB, and they both bust a gut helping others in need, including immigrants and refugees.

I will not lay a trap and ask you to name one who fits this description (something not allowed here). I will just say I do not believe you for a second that there is such a one as you describe.

 

[pnewton]

Having thousands of people from other countries decide to impose themselves on targeted countries that they have unilaterally decided ought to welcome them is rather unusual in its audacity

Now that is a word I think describes them. These people definitely should not be taken at face value. But you know MS13 members are pretty easy to recognize. Others will be harder, but this one group keeps getting put out there despite the fact they originated in Los Angeles and are probably the easiest gang to recognize. They are not a very realistic boogeyman.

 

[blackforest]

So why are you not a “bigot” for turning away the non “well-vetted” ones?

Bigotry is an act of unwarranted discrimination toward somebody because of their race, gender, orientation, etc. There are practical reasons, however, to turn someone away for past criminal activity or overtly nefarious intentions.

You and I both know this is true, but I’ll indulge you by explaining it anyway.

My understanding is that upwards of 94% of any claiming asylum are permitted to enter the country and remain for years before their status is judicially determined.

I wouldn’t be surprised if it were true. This is a red-tape problem that needs to be dealt with on an administrative level. Administrative incompetence is not a valid excuse to turn away desperate migrants, however.

As for “stop getting angry,” why are you assuming anger on my part? Perhaps you are projecting your own emotional turmoil?

No. I’m fine. Thanks.

It certainly doesn’t do anything to help the home countries of the economic migrants because it functions to empty those countries of potentially valuable, industrious and tenacious individuals.

Leaving to flee violence is not the same as “economic migration.”

 

[Augustinian]

If America is going to accept whatever immigrants and refugees that want to come here, the country’s economy is going to have to expand exponentially. There is definitely enough physical space to accept the 170 million people that pollsters say want to come here.

But there has to be things for these individuals to do for this to work out.

The economy has been growing fairly well over the past 20 months or so, but we really are going to have to do better, encouraging more mining and manufacturing is the key.

 

[blackforest]

Exactly right. If Honduras is sending their best citizens to the US to be illegal aliens, how does that really help those who want to make Honduras great again?

They’re sending them to petition for asylum, not “be illegal aliens.”

Specifically what should an impoverished, unarmed citizen do to “make Honduras great again?”

 

[Augustinian]

Specifically what should an impoverished, unarmed citizen do to “make Honduras great again?”

I know coming to America isn’t going to help Honduras become great again, particularly when its the Republic’s finest citizens that are fleeing the nation.

Its really up to the leadership in Honduras to do what they can- Cleaning up the crime problem would be a good first step. Negotiating with and bringing mining and industry, 5 star resorts and other economic entities that will create jobs has worked in other places.

 

[blackforest]

So impoverished, unarmed citizens should just wait around dodging bullets until their notoriously corrupt government decides to “make Honduras great again.” Gotcha.

In the meantime, what do you mean by “great again?” When in history was Honduras “great?” What did greatness look like there? Did such a Utopia even exist? Or is this just blind parroting of empty Trumpian rhetoric?

 

[Augustinian]

So impoverished, unarmed citizens should just wait around dodging bullets until their notoriously corrupt government decides to “make Honduras great again.” Gotcha.

If everyone who can leave Honduras to come to the United States does, what fate are you leaving those who are left behind to?

 

[blackforest]

If they all stay behind, what fate are you leaving to them?

 

[pnewton]

If America is going to accept whatever immigrants and refugees that want to come here, the country’s economy is going to have to expand exponentially.

Economic expansion is good, I would think. A larger labor force is one of three things needed for economic expansion. If we really wanted to “make America great” and not just white, or English-speaking, more labor is a part of that. If we were to manage immigration rather than limit it, we could be so much more than we are today.

That said, liberals would have to give up some of their goals as well. Poverty in the United States for those who were immigrants might stretch a generation or two, and this would have to be seen as an improvement over life in a third world country as opposed to a lower class in the United States; a step for a better life for one’s children and grandchildren, as opposed to gratification in one’s own life.

It has been done before. Interestingly enough, Carnegie crossed my mind as well.

 

[Augustinian]

If they all stay behind, what fate are you leaving to them?

The American economy can definitely expand its manufacturing and mining sectors and really get growing to bring a hundred million or more people into the country and working.

However, leaving large portions of the globe to be crime ridden unlivable sties of corruption would be a major problem.

The Honduran people are a tremendous people , it would be better if they worked on their own country.

 

[Augustinian]

more labor is a part of that. If we were to manage immigration rather than limit it

The idea is to create the jobs, like we did when guys like Frick and Carnegie and numerous others encouraged folks to come to America for challenging ground floor opportunities in coal excavation and transportation.

Its a mistake to accept any immigrants if there is nothing for them to do here.

 

[blackforest]

The Honduran people are a tremendous people , it would be better if they worked on their own country.

Indeed, provided they stay alive.

 

[redbetta]

I think they first need to make Honduras great once before they can start making it great again.