“As long as there’s a single homeless child or vet in America, no refugees.”
“Okay, so, what should we do about the homeless?”
“Nothing.”
“What? Why not?”
“They’re the only thing keeping the refugees out.”
We should stop *re-electing * conservative lawmakers.
Among other things, it seems to suppose that it’s possible to eliminate all homeless children and vets, which is an impossible and thus stupid supposition, and it also suggests that perfection in dealing with the situations of said kids and vets (another impossibility) should be achieved before it’s worth trying to do any good with refugees’ situations.There’s so much stupid there that it hurts to think about it.
Of course it’s really just a smokescreen for not wanting to accept refugees. It would be refreshing if they’d actually come out and say “because I don’t like it” instead of trying to construct reasons and explanations that purport to be sensible but actually never are.
That was one absolutely righteous rant from Fred Clark.
And it turns out that over the past 5 years, the Obama Administration has made a serious dent in homelessness among veterans, reducing it by 36% (sorry, Fred, 50% was the reduction in unsheltered homelessness among veterans - still important, but still a slightly different thing).
So the questions to ask the people who are saying ‘no refugees as long as there are homeless veterans’ are: (1) did you know this? and (2) are you going to bug your legislators to see this program through to get rid of homelessness among veterans altogether?
Gary why do you tempt me with such sweet sweet plump juicy low hanging fruit such as this? The call of the snark-berry is so difficult to resist!
On a more serious note, I’m all for bringing in refugees AND helping all the homeless folks, kids, vets, cats and dogs too.
The notion that we should NOT do “X” until we fix “Y” at home is an emotional reaction to some sort of perceived threat to well being and not rationally thought out at all.
ON the flip side, cries that its all conservatives fault and that they don’t care/are a bunch of heartless fiends is equally emotional and irrational.
Honestly, why can’t we do both? Why not help people in need here and bring in refugees
you will never eliminate the poor, they will be with you always
So, what programs to deal with homelessness among veterans have conservatives proposed?
The GOP has been in control of Congress for a year now. What solutions to any problems involving less-than-well-off people have passed the House, where they can’t be filibustered?
Sorry, but I’m not going to let false-equivalence bullshit go unchallenged.
I’m just glad to be living in a country which, for all it’s problems, people try to get/sneak into, instead of out of.
My great-grandfather could probably have related to the Syrian refugees. He was a sixteen year old German draft dodger who didn’t want to be caught up in Bismarcks army, and be cannon fodder. He even committed a crime(stowing away on a ship) to get to the USA. He did have a place to go to though, his brother in Kansas, so I suppose technically he wasn’t homeless, but all he wanted was to get away from war and fighting.
Nope, I gotta retract that statement, the above two quotes from Little Nemo and dougie_monty switched my thinking to a different frame of reference somehow, one that while connected to the topic of this thread isn’t really about this topic specifically. I didn’t realize it at the time I posted it but thanks for calling me on it.
some days I need a waiting period on posting:smack:
I find my country’s immigration policy seems to favor bringing in people to fill crappy jobs at crappy wages. Or better jobs, but at lower than the current wages. Of course this may still seem a great thing for the person immigrating. But it contributes to a lowering of standards and wages. Many immigrants are treated terribly, especially those on temporary work permits. I prefer that we accept a good share of refugees that are in danger, rather than people to use as cheap labor. If we do that, then we should also greatly increase aid to countries that have desperate economic problems for their people, to make their country one of greater opportunity. We should not be destroying other countries because we want a particular government there, or desire to practically steal their resources and labor. We should not be keeping them poor.
Not only will that solve the ISIS terrorist problem, we won’t have cops shooting unarmed black men in America any longer. White mentally ill guys with guns won’t go on shooting sprees in schools and theatres. Our prisons will be empty. Drunk drivers will no longer roam American’s streets. This solves all of America’s problems!
(Will we still need to pay taxes?)