This is what Americans once believed in:
“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.” ― Emma Lazarus
Now groups of Americans scream at refugee children, telling them to GO HOME! WE DON'T WANT YOU HERE!
The nasty posts we've read on so many conservative blogs shows us, sadly, that we've learned nothing and we do not believe a word of what the plaque on Lady Liberty says. We're now repeating what we've done in our recent past to other refugees. After the Vietnamese conflict, many refugees who supported America in the war came to this country. They were met with exactly the same sort of abuse and animosity that the refugee children from Central America are receiving.
Shame on us. We brag about being the beacon of hope and freedom in the world, then when we're tested on how serious we are about those ideals, we tell the freedom seekers to GO BACK HOME! WE DON'T WANT YOU!
Digby:
Unfortunately, this is as American as apple pie. The following is an excerpt from Rick Perlstein's forthcoming book called "The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan." It's about how we welcomed the Vietnamese refugees who were forced to leave their country after having allied themselves with the US during the war:
After the Vietnam War, the US accepted 531,310 Vietnamese political refugees and asylum seekers.
At the time, a majority of Americans objected to the immigration. Despite protests, the Congress passed several pieces of legislation allowing Vietnamese refugees to stay in the US and eventually become citizens. Over 85% of those refugees became American citizens.
Disease, disease, disease , that's all I've heard," complained a congressman representing another relocation site, the San Diego County Marine base, Camp Pendleton of the phone calls he was getting. "They think of the Vietnamese as nothing but diseased job seekers." In Arkansas at Fort Chaffee which admitted twenty-five thousand refugees, the compound was so well guarded that a radical journalist compared it to the "strategic hamlets" the U.S. m military used to build in South Vietnam. A recently returned veteran told him, "I don't like the people personally. I didn't see anything worth saving and I don't now."
The protest placards read "GOOKS GO HOME."
Tea Party town hall erupts as Texas state Rep urges ‘compassion’ for migrant kids
What have we become?
35 comments:
How many people populated our nation at the time those stiring words were penned?
How many populate our land today?
How many do you believe should populate our land?
Will our population growth ever be of concern? Should it? If so when? If not, why not?
Should we bocome a nation of 1 billion, 2 billion, anothet China or India?
Tear jerking rhetoric does not solve problems. Nor does casting aspersions at those who see a problem and want to control it from growing larger and eventually unmanageable.
But I keep forgetting, I, like so many others are just heartless monsters.
RN, I think these are better questions because they address the current crisis:
"...most of the children crossing the border illegally, the deportation process is not that simple -- a 2008 anti-trafficking law requires unaccompanied minors from Central America to appear before an immigration judge, and a backlog of cases, made more extreme by the recent influx of migrant children, has delayed the legal process for many of these children. It can take months, even years, to send a case through the legal system, and in the interim, children are sent to live with family in the U.S., settling into a new life.
The law, the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, sought to crack down on modern day child slavery and trafficking -- it passed easily with support from both parties and was signed by President George W. Bush. While its proponents argue that the law is still necessary to defend the children currently in the system, as wells as future refugees, critics are working on doing away with it in order to expedite the deportation process.
Does the U.S. have the resources to continue detaining and processing child migrants using the current legal system? Is it fair to end the anti-trafficking law in order to speed up deportation of unaccompanied minors from Central America? What’s the best way for the U.S. to approach this issue?"
"...children from a non-contiguous nation, such as those in Central America, have a different process.
The children must be turned over to the Department of Health and Human Services which is in charge of their care, finds them safe housing, and apprises them of their legal rights as their immigration cases are decided. Deportation proceedings can take time as immigration courts are generally backed up.
Republicans, who in recent weeks have claimed that the Obama administration is not enforcing the laws passed by Congress, are actually demanding that the president not enforce the TVPRA and send the children back to their home countries immediately without any deportation hearings."
"...though we debate this issue now [with regard] to Mexicans and those from Central American countries, this is not the first time we as a nation have had this discussion. In the mid-19th century, it was over Irish immigrants. Most were processed legally through Ellis Island but the same arguments that were used then are still being used today against legal and illegal immigrants.
In the end, the TVPRA is a law passed by Congress that President Obama must enforce. If Republicans in Congress have a problem with that, then they need to change the law instead of telling the president not to enforce it."
Obummer is a diktater if he doesn't enforce the laws and a diktater if he does.
These people can't make up their minds. What's left of them.
RN,
If I didn't know better, I would say you are advocating population control. Perhaps I don't know better.
So your conclusion is to let everybody in?
Shaw, I. am aware of the TVPRA and it's bipartisan support in Congress when passed.
I am also aware the sitting president did not cause the problem and he must enforce current law. I am not a dunce.
I realize the current situation must be addressed and handled according to current law.
I disagree your questions are better, however they will attempt effectively evade the broader and real concerns my questions bring up. Questions that will need to be addressed and progressives wish to avoid confronting IMO based on what I observe.
Anonymous said...
So your conclusion is to let everybody in?
There is nothing in this post that even hints that, so why do you suggest something I never said or proposed? Do you not understand what this post is about? Do you not understand how countries handle refugees? Nowhere in this post do I or anyone suggest letting millions of undocumented people into the country.
This is about a law passed by GWBush's administration and that law essentially says the children/adults from nono-contiguous countries who are seeking refuge MUST BE PROCESSED to determine if they can be given refuge before sending any of them back. That's what's going on here.
If by population control you mean forced sterilization you would be 100% correct in knowing I am AGAINST the it Jerry.
Anyway, I thought it was progressives who believe in all powerful government that would support such government practices. :-)
Hey Shaw, how many of these "refugees" have you taken in? If the answer in 0 or none then shut the f..k up!
Hey Jon,
First of all I didn't post that comment at AOW's blog. One of her idiot conservative commenters (she seems to have an unlimited supply of jerks who pretend to be me)posted it, and you answered the impostor, not me.
Brilliant.
I do not put my blog postings in AOW's comment section, her intellectually challenged fanboys do it all the time, and she allows it for reasons only she knows.
You people don't have the balls to come here and challenge me on what I post, so you do it in a cowardly way, behind my back. That's not surprising for the way you people operate.
And this, Jon: How many infants have you adopted from girls and women who were forced to have them because their states have closed down clinics that are legal? If the answer is 0 or none then I suggest YOU STFU.
And I mean that in the nicest way.
True they don't have the cojones to interact here, but they don't have the brains to either.
If that's the same john berg who comments at aow blog don't expect anything intelligent from him. He's a nasty piece of work full of anger and says the dirtiest things about liberals and anyone who isn't a bagger. You're better off ignoring the chap. He's not worth your time.
Yeah, those damn pesky ignorant people with different viewpoints should just be ignored so they go away quietly.
That being said, some, however not ALL conservatives are as classless and uncivil as Jon Berg @ 3:46 PM.
Of course to be fair and balanced there are instances of some, however not ALL liberals being boorish or lacking in civility as well.
So liberals don't want to be the world's police,but they want us to be the world's orphanage
Lisa, there's nothing in this post that says that. You've misread it.
Lisa, where do you see that in the post, or comments?
However RN, if people are civil, they are not banned here solely on the basis of a different viewpoint, something that now can't be said about some of the conservative sites we've all commented on...
Here's how the Vietnamese refugees were handled in our recent past:
"South Vietnamese refugees initially faced resentment by Americans following the turmoil and upheaval of the Vietnam War. A poll taken in 1975 showed only 36 percent of Americans were in favor of Vietnamese immigration."
People have short memories. Not much has changed vis-a-vis refugees, just the country they seeking refuge from.
"However, President Gerald Ford and other officials strongly supported Vietnamese immigration and passed the Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act in 1975, which allowed Vietnamese refugees to enter the United States under a special status."
Those were the days when Republicans and Democrats worked together to do the right thing, and when a Republican in the White House understood the meaning of the words on the Statue of Liberty. Bravo to President Ford, a good man.
"To prevent the refugees from forming ethnic enclaves and to minimize their impact on local communities, they were scattered all over the country. Within a few years, however, many had resettled in California and Texas."
And those refugees and the subsequent generation have all become loyal Americans who thrive in the communities where they settled.
To hear some people on the right, you'd think we were a third world country with no resources to handle the refugee children coming here from Central America.
The other misunderstanding that persists on the right (and that misinformed people have written in my comments) is that Obama is giving amnesty to these children. He is NOT. He is following the law GWBush set out.
But it's easier to stamp one's foot and talk about a knee-jerk soluntion. One person actually suggests that people who support the processing of these children under the law take them into their homes! Did that person suggest that for the Vietnamese refugees?
Of course not. People's memories are short and to them there is no such thing as history. That takes reflection, understanding and willingness to cooperate and solve problems. Things that are very much lacking in today's political atmosphere.
It's much, much easier to scream at children and feel righteous about it.
PS. I fully expect the above to be copied and pasted into AOW's blog, since some of her demented followers have done so with almost all my comments and blog posts.
They give me free exposure to their sites, and I don't have to bother to go there to leave my opinions!
Thank you all who allow my opinions to get broadcast there and everywhere else and who save me the time and effort of doing it myself.
Plus, you must adore my blog because you keep running here all day every day to see what I've written.
Thank you. And have a nice day!
It appears, Shaw, that they are some of your greatest supporters. They willingly spread your opinions to help inform those who don't fully understand what makes this country great. They help open the closed, self-centered minds of the radical right. They are your secret weapon, spreading your influence with no effort on your part.
Well done!
Dave, I was not talking about banning. As well I agree that Jon Berg is boorish.
So, please forgive me when I ask, what exactly was your point?
Why do you allow that "Lisa," who's probably a guy post here. He allowed a comment who said your mother should have aborted you. What kind of swine would allow that on his blog?
In the morning paper, I find this letter to the editor: “[Obama] has brought America to its knees. Now terrorists enter the United States in the guise of children” (Ruth Elisabeth Bennett, Press Journal, Monday, July 28, 2014).
The above quotation reminds me of the concluding sentence in Hofstadter’s landmark article:
“We are all sufferers from history, but the paranoid is a double sufferer, since he is afflicted not only by the real world, with the rest of us, but by his fantasies as well (The Paranoid Style in American Politics. Harpers, November 1963).
Since the beginning of the Republic, Hofstadter reminds us, the paranoid style has always been a feature of American politics. Radical fringe groups, delusions, fantastic conspiracies, dire warnings of doom and gloom, an Apocalyptic End Time – these have always been with us and always will be as assuredly as the incidence rate for voices in the head is constant in the general population.
Ruth Elisabeth Bennett, AOW, Lisa, and Jon Berg are merely the latest iteration - and a mediocre bunch more laughable and pathetic than worthy of our time.
Every child who arrives here plans to stay and most will. They will go to public schools paid for by homeowners taxes, mostly middle class homeowners. The adults who enter the country will either take a minimum wage job, go on welfare or become a criminal.
This is much to do about nothing because this country was built on immigrants. Native Americans don't have much standing any longer because there are to few to swing an election.
Yeah Skud, you're right, there are not all that many native Americans left. You know the ones I'm taking about, the natives that were here in what is present day USA when Amerigo Vespucci (sp.?).arrived on the scencr followed by the European settlers.
Yep, we are certainly nation of immigrants.
We ARE a nation of immigrants. And we are becoming increasingly a nation of I got mine, so screw you.
Jerry, is that a OWS proclamation?
Frankly it is very tedious listening to the drumbeat. Why? Because it is time the left strips its rhetoric and state what it REALLY means, come clean on the ideologies real goals.
Sad thing is the right cloaks its real goals as well.
And, the people who try and weigh both agendas honestly and choose a reasonable course get ridiculed by they and right.
All Hail Partisanship!
The point being Les that at some conservative blogs, we are not even allowed to participate, and offer opposing viewpoints, no matter how civil we are.
To them, simply having a different viewpoint is considered uncivil and boorish, no matter how well argued or supported by facts.
Just the truth, RN.
Both sides may do it, but it is slanted right 10 to 1.
I do realize this Dave. Even individuals with a fair amount of what would be considered conservative posistions are treated the same when they question the script and agenda embraced by them. They are more boorish and uncivil by far than those they accuse of being so.
Both sides may do it, but it is slanted right 10 to 1.
The 10 to 1 ratio you apparently puled from your hat and tossed out Jerry is simply more hyper partisan hyperbole and propaganda.
When's the last time that a pope Invited by the speaker of the house may have that invitation withdrawn? The invitation has languished in some house committee ever Speaker Boehner invited Pope Francis earlier this year.
Why? Because CONSERVATIVE members think Pope Francis is too LIBERAL!
Do these cranks like anyone? What a bunch is angry, unhappy creeps.
RN,
Can you honestly say that in your opinion the crazy is equal on both sides?
The US being a nation of "I got mine, so screw you" is most certainly NOT an OWS proclamation, but a Conservative/Libertarian/Objectivist one.
These children should get their hearings and (possibly) qualify as refugees and be allowed to stay. But I've heard that it is Obama who is fast-tracking their deportations.
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