Well, Bush has done it again. After all these years, I am almost tempted to believe that he is deliberately doing his best to throw America into chaos. Bush's latest move is to throw open the doors for seven thousand Iraqi refugees.
If this keeps up, it will simply be cheaper to overtake Iraq completely, declare it to be the 51st State in America, and settle in. Of course we'd have to seal the borders there better than we do here, but it could be done.
This decision was made as breezily as if Bush was choosing between the lobster and the prime rib at a local steakhouse. As if we don't have enough problems with the illegal immigrants sucking our social security and welfare dry (even though they never paid into it), driving up our medical costs and overtaxing the hospitals. Sure! Why not? 7,000 more mouths to feed. Because (don't kid yourself) these people will be permanent residents of... the welfare rolls.
Of those 7,000, how many speak English? How many will have to be taught on our dollar, while living on our dollar? How many women would be qualified to work at all? And how many men in Iraq truly have marketable skills? These are questions that we need to be asking ourselves before we do this.
I'm sure President Bush loves looking like the Savior of Iraq. But, at what cost to the American people? This is as ill-considered as sending money overseas to Africa, when we know that the majority of it is intercepted by power-hungry provincial warlords. But because Bush apparently feels that the "appearance" is better than the reality of it, our hard-earned monies continue to flow out of the country. Remember that on Tax Day.
Oh, but "7,000 is a small number," said Ali Mahmoud, 60, also a former chairman at Iraqi House, which was set up after the first Gulf War. "It might encourage other countries to do the same." Sure, sure it will. Just as our other actions there have encouraged them to pitch in.
Well, why not? We're letting everyone in these days. Just ask Mexican Presidente Felipe Calderon.
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17 comments:
Seven thousand is a lot of immigrants to assimilate at once. Yeah, it would cause problems here, but its just a drop in the bucket compared to the Iraqis who are suffering. It would be SO much cheaper and more effective to help them stay home. Their government and oil fields may be in danger, but the citizens would be so much safer if we just left Iraq.
Unless they completely forego immigration laws, they can't go directly to welfare. In order to immigrate, they have to have a sponsor and that sponser has to prove enough assets to show that they won't become a burden on our society. In my case, I am responsible for my immigrant wife and any debts that she might accumalate until she gets a permanent greencard (still working on this three years later) or becomes a citizen.
Secondly, I'm guessing that the 7000 aren't blue collar Iraqis but ones with money and can afford to immigrate if given the chance. They can't get visas without money in the post 9/11 world.
I would much rather have someone who went through proper immigration channels and truly desires to live in our country than someone who snuck across the border, disobeyed our laws and could possibly be given ammnesty by our government.
Actually I would guess that most of the immigrants would speak English. The USA is one of the few nations left that do not teach a foreign language in schools. And like you said, those let in will likely not be the swarmy masses, but the wealthy elite. Probably the same wealthy elite Baathists we are trying to get rid of over there. They will also probably have marketable skills. The CIA most likely still needs interrogators.
And if all else fails, major cities always need more taxi cab drivers.
As for sabotaging America, I do not think Bush is able to think that far in advance. You know how a master chess player is thinking 6 or more moves in advance, and a regular good plater can think up to three moves in advance? Well Bush probably does not consider his move till it is his turn.
Saur kraut, 7000 Iraqi refugees?
I thought the wholde idea of deposing the evil Iraqi regime was that the Iraqi refugees from the Saddam era, could return home take power - and give US contractors lucrative deals to rebuild iraq and Texaco a licence to pump iraqi oil (not much lefy in Texas u see)
So how was your Valentine's Day?
Quasar, exactly! We were supposed to make Iraqi a safe country for their citizens. Now we're relocating them???
V-Day was very nice. I got SaurKid some cool Valentines w/ candy and we just kicked back and watched TV. ;o)
Lazy, excellent points... but see what Quasar and I said. But you're probably right (you usually are).
Ed, I don't think this is the case here. If there's any "sponsors" involved, it would be Uncle Sam. After all, where will you find 7,000 sponsors? That seems far-fetched. Granted, at least they're legal. Hopefully they're not sleeper-terrorists.
Miss C, it might be true that Iraqis are suffering, but since when did we become the World's Policemen and Nation Builders? That was supposed to go out with the British regime of the 1800s.
I'm a little late in getting over here to wish you a Happy Valentines Day.... but am glad you were able to kick back with Saurkid and enjoy.
As far as Bush.... should we be surprised? This whole war was never thought out to begin with... and as usual for this administration, they are shooting from the hip all the way. Too bad they never noticed that the gun was facing down at their feet... and silly us, we didn't notice it either at first.
We are in for the long haul, whether we like it or not, and Bush's free pass to America for refugees is supposed to be a feather in his cap that he is not the war-monger that the world views him as. Sorry, the man is a complete buffoon, and there isn't too much he can do at this point to change his image in my eyes.
Hope you are well.... and sending prayers that the new surgery to your neck takes, and ends your long ordeal. Take care.
Okay, I don't want to be totally attacking you, but this is about the craziest stuff I have heard from you. You (US) go to Iraq, blow up the entire country, kill hundreds of thousands of men, women and children, then allow ONLY 7,000 of them the chance for a better life. I think that the real problem is that the US is not letting enough people in and not doing enough to rebuild a country that they have destroyed. From my point of view this may have been the only thing that Bush has done right. I hope that you feel some compassion for these poor people.
Scott
As a country we spend more on other countries than we do taking care of our own.
I have not been too tuned into the news lately but I don't think this sounds like a good thing to me! How do we know they will not come with other intentions in mind! Our safety needs to come first!
Perhaps getting SOMEONE to leave their country was thought of as a positive? Too bad it couldn't have been our troops!
i wonder if they even want to be saved. he is a raving lunatic
Saur dear, I am not going to comment on the Iraqi refugee thing. I do not know enough about it. Anyway - the whole war in Iraq is a mess.
What I do want to comment on is this statement of yours:
"This is as ill-considered as sending money overseas to Africa, when we know that the majority of it is intercepted by power-hungry provincial warlords."
*clears throat* - I have spent the last 18 months making sure US money is put to good use in all the countries I have visited. I wish you would reconsider that statement - it is very demeaning to the world of humanitarian work, and more importantly, it's not accurate.
I promise you that most of the funds that I audit make their way to the people who need them, the hungry, the ill, the destitute. If there is loss along the way, it is usually due to fraudulent activities that have nothing to do with warlords and everything to do with personnal gain.
And people like me travel away from their families and friends, all year long, to catch them.
Any way - just thought I'd clear some of that up.
Take care,
Beav'
We're supposed to accept refugees from an illegal war when my cousin has been trying for 7 years and has spent over $10,000 to become a legal citizen? I think this is crap!
UWL, exactly! I know of some very deserving people who would jump through hoops to be here, and they are genuine refugees.
Beav, you know, I appreciate the contribution. I would gladly stand corrected on this. However, the statistics that I have seen indicate that the majority of our funds are wasted. Do you have any percentages as to how much is really being utilized on the deserving?
Badoozie, I have no idea why they'd want to come HERE when Iraq is their homeland and we're supposedly making it a better place to live... according to Bush...
Emma, We agree 100%.
Debbie, well, I don't know if we spend more, but we have a tremendous need in this country to take better care of our own. We should see to ourselves before we see to others. We could spend money on the wall that needs to be built between us and Mexico. We could spend it on our poor, our homeless. We could spend it in our schools where education continues to decline. We could spend it on metal detectors for our schools. We could beef up national security. Etc., etc., etc.
Scott, hon, you don't offend me. I understand not everyone will agree... but when do two wrongs make a right? Just because we've made the mistake of staying in Iraq, do we really need to compound the error?
Ellen, well said, and a happy V-Day to you too, hon!
Most likely they will be the famiilies of Iraq citizens who have been serving as interpreters or in other capacaties with U.S.Troops and are now being identified and sought after for murderous purposes by the various militias. Perhaps we could paint
American flags on them and send them out into the streets to die. (That is about what happened to the Hmong and others who fought with the U.S. in Vietnam.)
Yes, this Iraqi refugee situation is not good for America. And I agree with one of your opening remarks about being tempted to believe Bush is deliberately trying to throw America into chaos. Only I'm not tempted. I do believe this to be the case. Take for instance this American Union and NAFTA Super Corridor his administration is pushing on Americans. This is nothing more than a marriage of multinational corporations and big government. Fascism in other words. And from what I've studied about it, it will permanently alter the way our representative form of government will work, going so far as to make it null and void, just like the European Union's form of government.
So sorry you're sick today. Been there, done that. And recently.
I thought you might want to hop over to my blog and listen to one of our local talk radio show hosts interview one of our state representatives about the American Union and the NAFTA Super Corridor.
Get well soon.
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