Considering the excellent record of assimilation within the American Muslim community, including a greater tolerance and acceptance for homosexuality than evangelicals and Mormons, allowing more Muslim immigration seems like a great way to make more moderate Muslims, while cutting them off seems like a great way to do what ISIL wants us to do. The worst threat to ISIL is that Muslims see America and the West as open and tolerant of Muslim people.
Pols like Andre Carson and Keith Ellison, who are cleverly taking away your civil rights in the US House of Representatives? Or perhaps merely civil servants like Zalmay Khalilzad, the civil rights-stealing former US Ambassador to the United Nations? Or Elias Zerhouni, devious and conniving director of the National Institutes for Health?
“Mass immigration”–which is not happening here–has always been a focus for fear. No Irish need apply, and Kennedy will be a puppet of Rome. The Germans will never assimilate. Those filthy Eyeties still speak their own language, they will ruin our economy. How on earth can any town support so much Vietnamese/Somali/Ukrainian/Cuban immigration, we’ll be overwhelmed!
I know it’s hard, but try to let go of some of your fear. US society is not as weak and fragile as you might think.
Please allow me to ask for clarification on this. What did you think a reference to 2007 was proving?
FYI: a net loss of illegal immigrants =/= a secure border. It simply means many illegals are going back through the porous border from whence they came.
The secular liberal values originating and codified by white men dating back to the Enlightenment and upon which Western societies are grounded.
Values which have evolved over the centuries to include the abolition of slavery, women’s suffrage and equal rights, legal protections for minorities, and, now, the legalization of gay marriage.
You know, the values that are anathema to much of the Islamic world.
How are these “white values” when so many non-white people were absolutely integral to their development, and when so many of these values and rights were favored at various times by far more non-white people than white people?
They were culturally appropriating the values of my people and cannot take them to be their own.
What white supremacist bullshit. Martin Luther King Jr, Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, and many others were not “culturally appropriating” white values – they were fighting against them.
Sure looks like at least one is anathema to you, too.
I do feel the 13th Amendment needs to be looked at. I mean, it had its time but this is 2016.
Maybe when Congress is repealing amendments enacted to give citizens the force to repel tyranny they can get a two-fer with the 13th.
Be careful what you wish for. The result may not be what you expected.
It’s fascinating how the same people who believe the U.S. military is the best fighting force in the world capable of defeating any enemy are invariably the same people who think they can successfully take on the 82nd Airborne from behind their living room couch with their trusty AR-15.
There’s an argument there but I don’t think it’ll hold up. The First Amendment doesn’t list freedom of religion as a individual right; if it did you could argue that such a right only exists inside the United States. But the First Amendment is actually a limit on the government; it says the United States government can’t enact a law which establishes a religion or prohibits the free exercise of a religion. So even though the law you’re discussing wouldn’t apply directly to any American citizen, it’s still unconstitutional.
Another issue would be whether prohibiting a single religion is the equivalent of establishing a religion; arguably, you’re not giving a favored status to any other religion by giving a disfavored status to one religion. But the Hialeah decision seems to have ruled out that argument; it ruled that a law which placed a burden on one religion was unconstitutional.
Obviously, some laws do restrict religions; we don’t allow things like human sacrifice. And the current status on what standard should be applied to a law which restricts a religion is confusing. But I don’t see how a blanket ban on Muslims would pass a Sherbert test or a Smith test.
Am I understanding you correctly? Are you suggesting we should legalize slavery?
Nah, he’s just trying to draw an equivalence between owning guns, and not being able to own people. Because he’s not very good at debate.
Yes!
And also abolish “women’s suffrage and equal rights, legal protections for minorities, and, now, the legalization of gay marriage.”
Or am I then culturally appropriating the high sophistication of Islamic cultures?
I was a muslim immigrant 14 years ago. I work as a computer engineer, don’t have a criminal record, pay taxes, vote and am trying to achieve the american dream. When I visit family and friends in Morocco, I defend the USA from conspiracy theories and extoll the the noble principles this country was founded upon. I cherish the constitution and I have sworn to defend it from enemies both foreign and domestic.
Should I have been banned from entering? Have I been a net positive or a net negative to the USA? How many muslim immigrants are like me and how many are violent felons harming society? What is the ratio of goodness to badness and what would it need to be for you to change your mind? 100 to 1? 1,000 to 1? 10,000 to 1? 1,000,000 to 1?
After you’ve decided that, go ahead and guess what the ratio you live with for non-immigrant americans and ask yourself if both ratios should be equal, or if you have higher standards for immigrants. If so, what is your justification?
These are the kind of questions you should ask yourself. And after you ask them, hopefully you will realize that none of us is immune from bigotry and racism (I certainly am not), and that we should actively fight those demons rather than forge alliances with them so we can be morally lazy and feel good about ourselves while scapegoating others.
Being a good person is not supposed to be easy. Not for most people anyways. Not for me.
As an aside, I’m agnostic now. The SDMB convinced me that religious texts are full of flaws. I think you might underestimate the power of the united states to charm and change immigrants. People fall in love with this country (allegedly, it was easier before Trump ). Don’t underestimate the power of Love 
No, we already did that when we borrowed algebra, trigonometry, and Hindu-Arabic numerals.
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“Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion…”
There are 1.6 billion Muslims on the planet. That’s a pretty big brush you’re painting with.
Brunch. Mumford & Sons concerts.
A while back when visiting New York City I read a poem that went like this:
I suppose the people who claim that they are going to make America great again would call that “leftist bullshit”, if it had been written today. Which to me is a clear indicator that they have no idea what it was that made America great in the first place. Back in 1883 when that poem was written America was already facing immigration. Not so much from Muslim countries, but the people pouring in from Germany (including someone’s Grandpa), Ireland, Italy and wherever were causing enough problems of their own. A lot of problems actually. *That *America dealt with these problems and it became stronger for it emerging as the world’s foremost superpower in the coming decades. You will not make America great again, if you choose to bunker up out of fear of what a few extremist might do to you. The opposite will happen. Or maybe I should say it *would *happen, because I still refuse to believe that the policy of fear will find a majority in the US.