1 Muslims don't assimilate so well

2 Look at Dearborn, Michigan. It's a no go zone these days. How is that assimilating? Isn't the premise of out of many, one, that we are live and work together, rather than in separate enclaves that other groups don't dare to enter. That reeks of ethnic gangland, which doesn't seem very American at all. Unless you LIKED New York and Chicago during their mob heydays in the 20's. I guess it does make for better press. There would be nothing to report if we all got along.

3 Some of the old and specious arguments that were used in the past were that the immigrants would bring disease, no work ethic, and all of their relatives. Those arguments were mostly false, as the cities that bore the brunt of late 19th century immigration became more wealthy.

Unfortunately the new crop of immigrants has brought exactly the problems that were expected, just 100 years late.

4 I remember in grade school learning about the horrible backlash catholic immigrants faced after a few catholic extremist bombed Pearl Harbor.

5

My fearless prediction: Geoff gets the full-blown Sobran/Sailer/Coulter treatment sometime within the next 30 days.

Dude - it was nice knowin' ya.

 

6 Unfortunately the new crop of immigrants has brought exactly the problems that were expected, just 100 years late.

...if you didn't work when you immigrated here in 1890, you starved to death.  If you didn't pass your physical examination at Ellis Island (or Boston, where my ancestors came through), they sent you back to Europe.

It's all so fucking simple.

7 Immigration policy needs to be based on two factors:

1) What the adult immigrant can bring to the table.

2) The likelihood of the adult immigrant to assimilate into American society.

8 Yup, them Catholics came to this country, many of the followers of their religious system trying to destroy our Constitution and our way of life...Oh wait, that's not what happened. They were ALREADY

9 Yup, them Catholics came to this country, many of the followers of their religious system trying to destroy our Constitution and our way of life...Oh wait, that's not what happened. They were ALREADY here when we became a nation, silly me! See Maryland's history.

10 Then you have the Buddhists. Oh wait, they weren't going around blowing things up!

11 We also used to refuse entry to undesirables.

Particularly if they had no way to support themselves.

12 Nor are Buddhists, as far as I know, trying to institute Vegetarianism as a form of governance along side ours, ala Sharia for the Muslims.

13 And the Russians. We got to keep the Russians out. Next thing ya know they will be buying up all the NBA teams?

14

Actualy, Catholics and Irish particularly proved themselves willing and able to assimilate, the American Civil War being an example. The 'shanty Irish' of the 69th Penn Volunteer Infantry was first formed as the 24th Penn Militia, and protected churches from the No-Nothing mobs. When they marched out of Philadelphia, trash was thrown at them. Two years later, they defended the Angle at Gettysburg. Their regimental commander, Col. Dennis O'Kane, was buried in Philadelphia, his coffin carried by six generals. The irish 'had arrived' in America, to use the old term for assimilation and acceptence, though it was noted that they arrived by te coffin handles.

it would be interesting to see such an example from the religion of peace.

15 Well, while we're at it, shouldn't we include all religions?  I understand that some Baal worshippers believe in human sacrifice, including ritual killing of children. And if the Aztecs ever make a comeback, we'll have to build pyramids in city parks so the high priests can display the freshly removed human hearts they offer up to their god or gods. And isn't it discriminatory to preclude Mormons from having more than one wife?

This is a typical liberal's way of reasoning -- they have suckered people with this apple sauce for many decades now. They themselves do not care whether they're hypocrites or not but they hope to use that hammer on us, the unwashed morons of the earth.

Islam is welcome. Islamic violence is not. And I hope they are prepared for the next great artwork featuring Mohammad.

16 Accusation against Catholics:
"They're loyalty is to Rome first and they're arming themselves to fight for the Pope!"
Catholic response:  "Hail Mary full of Grace..."

Accusation against Muslims: "They're terrorists and terrorist supporters."

Muslim response: "ALAHHU AKBAR!  BOOM!!"

17 it would be interesting to see such an example from the religion of peace.

Hello.

18 So the Boston Globe article is based on a faulty premise - that the outmoded concept of "give me your tired, your poor" is somehow a compelling motivation for modern immigration policy.

Why should we expect anything else from a liberal newspaper? They are all liars except for one thing. We do need immigration reform, just not what the commies and the RINOs think of as reform. We need to undo the damage that has been done by the last two reforms.

19 BTW, as for Muslims coming to America, two decades ago the only Muslims in America were those of the phony "Black Muslim" variety. Why the huge explosion recently? Because the "immigration laws" are seriously out of whack.

20 Yes we need immigration reform, but NOT what has been rolled out the last half dozen times. Every bill that has come out since the first major rewrite in 1965 has basically been amnesty and open invitation for illegals to flood across the border.

We are no longer the country of the 19th century with vast open areas in the West. Our cities are overcrowded shit holes run by corrupt communist hacks AND there is no longer a vast area open for the inhabitants to flee to and take up farming.

This is not to mention that we have entire towns in CA with a population > 20,000 in which none of the citizens speak English.  The current crew of "immigrants" do not appear to desire to assimilate and the current crowd of liberals do not think they should. The schools have gone from teaching America as a mixing pot to America as a salad bowl where "diversity" is celebrated and heritage counts for all, unless you have a European heritage then you are a racist.

Yes, there are a lot of things that need to be done to "fix" our immigration laws.  The first one of these should be to repeal that POS of Amnesty Round I that got us where we are today.

We need immigration law that does the following AND that is enforced:

1. Eliminate the BS anchor baby interpretation by providing a definition of what the term “and subject to the jurisdiction thereof” means, which is not dashing across the border to deliver a baby.  Personally, I would require that at least one of the parents of any child born in the U.S. be a citizen before that child was eligible for “birthright” citizenship. If not, then the child would have to undergo naturalization.

2. Provide a reliable means for employers to check the status of employees.

3. Provide severe punishments for knowingly hiring illegals (or reckless disregard). That punishment should include jail time for repeat violations.   

4. Eliminate ALL benefits for illegals including schools for children.

5. Rewrite legal immigration to allow in immigrants with a desirable education and/or skill set and arrange the waiting list to have the most skilled/educated at the top of the list. (Australian system) Also include a check for communicable diseases (as we did in the past) and provide for immunization. Immigrants from countries on the list of terror support need not apply.

6. For groups that already have large populations in the U.S. who have not assimilated, reduce the allowable numbers until they do (eliminate whole towns that do not speak English)

7. Provide severe penalties for mules.

8. Provide the death penalty for people involved in sex slavery.

9. Eliminate all forms of asylum. That system has been abused to the point of making it a joke. Any true case that needs to be let in should be a case by case special act passed by congress. Get them on record.

10. Immigrants who become involved in any serious crime prior to becoming a citizen should be deported back to their home country.

11. Absolutely no dual citizenship allowed.

21 Is there a chart where the numbers are normalized against the rising population? 

22 this is funny coming from a state that still looks ats Irish Americans (in certain wealthy enclaves)as beneath contempt.

23 I have Cherokee ancestry, now let's discuss the concept of

Unrestricted immigration????????/

24 John Raese for W-Virginia.

I love the way he serves up the CNN reporter in this clip...
PLEASE pass this on... this guy rocks!

25 Every time the problem of illegal aliens flooding across our borders  is mentioned
I hear a litany
about Immigration Reform

As a thought problem, say we Reform Immigration make it fulfill anyone's concept
of fair and balanced and seamless, whatever that is.

I submit we will STILL have more people wanting to come in than we can acomodate and those denied will do what?

Enter illegally so WHAT do you do then?

For you will NOT have done anything about the problem we have now.

26

Casanova compared the hostility toward Muslims to the hostility toward Catholics from the mid-19th to the mid-20th century. A wave of Catholic immigration unsettled the dominant Protestant establishment.

Funny, I must have missed the part in history class where those whacky Catholic's attacked and killed thousands of innocent civilians during the mid 19th-20th centuries.

I must have also missed the part where American citizens were brought to the Vatican and beheaded when they refused to convert.  Or the part where Catholic's kept commandeering ships and taking those people hostage.  Or the part where those darned Catholic's kept gathering together in large groups, burning the American flag and chanting about how they wanted us all dead.

Yup, I must have missed all that, otherwise I would have to find Casanova's entire comparisson to be way off base and quite frankly stupid.

27 The really cool thing about this is that people bandy about the figure of only about 10% of muslims are potentially "radical".  That means that we only have 700k potentially violent radicals in this country!  A rounding error.

28

Funny, I must have missed the part in history class where those whacky Catholic's attacked and killed thousands of innocent civilians during the mid 19th-20th centuries.

I must have also missed the part where American citizens were brought to the Vatican and beheaded when they refused to convert.  Or the part where Catholic's kept commandeering ships and taking those people hostage.  Or the part where those darned Catholic's kept gathering together in large groups, burning the American flag and chanting about how they wanted us all dead.

Yup, I must have missed all that, otherwise I would have to find Casanova's entire comparisson to be way off base and quite frankly stupid.

Posted by: StuckOnStupid

 

That's what those high convent walls were for.

Sincerely, Sen. Blaine

29 Is the anti-immigration issue in this country really about Muslims? I could have sworn it was about little brown Catholic guys mowing lawns. Restrictions on Muslim immigration has nothing to do with the immigration reform issue; it is purely a security issue.

30 Really? The most important part of American exceptionalism is that we drop everything American in favor of all the world's religions and civilizations?

Old and Busted:  E Pluribus Unum

The new Hotness: Out of one, many (which is what Gore thought E Pluribus Unum meant, the dolt!)

By the way, our system of government is very unique, even amongst the Western Democracies.  Shouldn't it get minority protection status? 

31 I dont have a problem with appealing to the concept of "nation of immigrants" but with some caveats... which were all mentioned here... willingness to assimilate politically and willingness to support oneself economically. The poster that mentions that we no longer have vast open spaces has a point, but many small businesses are opened by immigrants, so there are niches for them.

I also have no problem with favoring groups which have shown the willingness and ability to become American first. Muslims, at least from outside the U.S., have problems with this.

32 A couple of millennia on???? Who knew the US is 20 centuries old? The Boston Globe is like a AA farm team for the NYT and this writer ain't moving up to the bigs.

Do they even understand the function of an editor at the Globe?

33 First of all, can we please put to bed this concept of a nation of immigrants.

I know of no country where people sprang up out of the ground to form said country.

Until very recently, America has allowed influxes of immigrants then had a long pause to make assimilation possible, not continuous high levels of immigration and insidious multiculturalism.

34 The real aim of the fucking leftards is the destruction of traditional America and conversion to some Eurosocialist state. Look at what unlimited immigration is doing to the character of England. It's time to call a fucking halt to this mess, while there is still a fucking America we can recognize. Yeah, I'm anti immigration except in a controlled and reasoned fashion. We are not short of people and we don't have huge tracts of land we need settled. Fuck the foreigners from third world hell holes of their own making. We don't need them, they need us. But then they expect us to cater to them when they get here. Once again, fuck them.

35
I dont have a problem with appealing to the concept of "nation of immigrants" but with some caveats... which were all mentioned here... willingness to assimilate politically and willingness to support oneself economically.

I'm not suggesting restricting legal immigration, though some updating of that policy could be considered. I'm just saying that we don't need to feel obligated to continue acting as a "Nation of Immigrants" when that isn't an appropriate descriptor for much of the 20th century. Our policies should be based on today's needs and realities, not a reference to policies of the 18th and 19th centuries.

I can't count the number of libs who have quoted the Statue of Liberty inscription at me to argue in favor of illegal immigration. But that's just a poem, not a policy.

36 That "give me your huddled masses" plaque is not our constitution, it was just put in the base of the statue by people that donated money.  And as HeatherRadish says

"...if you didn't work when you immigrated here in 1890, you starved to death.  If you didn't pass your physical examination at Ellis Island (or Boston, where my ancestors came through), they sent you back to Europe.

It's all so fucking simple."

Only the destructive left could come up with "diversity is our strength".  Now Obama has advanced that to "America has taken too much from the world, time to redistribute".  Barry would water down any "exceptionalism" to where we are "equal" with the failures of the world.

Instead of the advancing the rest of the world, Barry would "diversify" America down to the insanity of mundanity.

37 Nation of Immigrants or Immigrant Nation. I don't think the two are the same. Immigrants should be asked to adhere to our national ideals. We should have some of those; so they have something to which they can adhere.

38 better take a look at who is getting all the PHDs in the USA now it is the foreign born not our own And muslims have a significantly higher income here than non muslims check out Allied Marketing's demographics muslims are like the new Jews all Doctors and Dentists

39

20, Vic, as usual I'm agreeing except for one small point.

There's a special category visa program for former Iraqi and Afghani interpreters, and I'm wholeheartedly in favor of that one. I know of at least four of my Iraqis who were killed in retaliation for helping us in the dark days of '06.

I've got another one of mine 2/3rds through the paperwork now.

 

40

Yes, I am really tiring of the "Muslims are the new Catholics!" meme.  As has been pointed out above, the analogy is historically bankrupt.  More to the point, Muslims are immigrating to America in an era in which assimilation is actively discouraged by the left. 

Here's the difference:  when the Catholics heaved up off the boat in the 19th Century, Catholic community leaders immediately began to integrate them into the wider community, via churches, schools, employment, voter registration, military service and social organizations (e.g., the Knights of Columbus).

By and large, the current crop of Muslim community leaders issues them a grievance card at the airport and works hard to instill a distrust of the authorities (e.g., CAIR trying to close off the Minnesota Somalis from speaking with the Feds).  There ain't no Muslim K of C, that's for sure.  Just the flying Imams and lawfare.

 

41

It also floors me that at a time of high Unemployment, we don't SLOW DOWN legal immigration.  We are still allowing about 1 million Legal Immigrants into this country every year... at a time when we are not creating enough jobs to support this influx.

But, we are stuck on stupid.

42

Ever nation is a nation of immigrants if you go back far enough.  What makes a nation is not the fact of one time immigration, but the shared ideals, history, culture, and, over time, ethnicity of the people.  America has had long stretches of low immigration, most notably from 1924-1965, and these periods have done a lot to allow earlier waves of immigrants to assimilate.

The current wave of immigration is troubling for several reasons.  First, unlike the past, we now have a generous social welfare apparatus, and immigrants tend to be poor and overuse these entitltments.  Two, immigrants today are deliberately skewed to the Third World, and these include Muslims.  Earlier waves, even Catholics, were mostly white.  In a few generations, they were indistinguishable from native born Americans.  New groups ar emore insular and obviously of foreign heritage long after they arrived.  Plus our public schools and national leaders do little to encourage assimilation, even going so far as to be indifferent to savage foreign customs like the Burqa or polygamy.  Three, our country has fewer jobs for low IQ people with the loss of its manufacturing sector, and many of these newer groups are lower education and lower IQ, and this is true for their kids as well.  This is a formula for multi-generational poverty.  Look at East LA.  Finally, the earlier wave is not as successful as sometimes it's made out; consider the Wobblie Riots, Soviet spies of the 1940s (i.e., the Rosenbergs, David Greenglass), strong support for European style socialism among immigrants vis a vis FDR, and the rise of labor unions at the turn of the century.

Immigration is America's false consciousness.  It is not what we're about either historically or as part of our founding documents and way of life.  It is a small part of our national character and only seems dominant because of the dominance of immigration in the identity of America's Northeast, which has disproportionate influence on our media and national conversations.  In any case, immigration today is clearly out of control, leading to an unnecessary population boom, the erasure of native born Americans in large parts of the country (Miami, Arizona) and straining our national unity and limited government ideals.  It is also deliberately erasing America's founding stock and majority and replacing them deliberately and thereby marginalizing them, not least because of the multiplier effect of affirmative action.  This is not right, and, more important, we were never asked by our elites in politics and business if this is what we want.  We are a generous and welcoming people; but there is a world of difference of a few guests and a de facto colonization. 

43 Liberals just love Muslims, because both schools of "thought" are profoundly anti-Western to the core. 

44 20-spot on, Vic. I especially agree with the death penalty for people involved in sex slavery-with public executions for those dealing in children. Public and gruesome. I want those bastards to hurt before they die, and their deaths to be a true caution for anyone else to try that evil, disgusting perversion. I would also add that the johns who buy little children should be given the death penalty too. I'm a giver that way. Slightly OT: Love 146 is a great ministry that works to rescue children from the sex trade. If you have a minute, take a look at their website.

45

Hmm, my family has been here since 1749.

Am I still considered an immigrant?

46

Short response:

It's not that the immigrants changed, it's that our expectations changed.

You came here, you were expected to assimilate. You don't set out to change America, America changes you. That was the expectation, and immigrants didn't question it.

Early in the 20th century, it was not shocking to hear the president proclaim that the main purpose of public education was to assimilate immigrants. Early in the 21st century, no politician could utter "assimilate" without chocking on the word - or being choked.

Immigrants will try to live up - or down - to our expectations. It's only human nature. Newcomers, anywhere, will change as little as possible, as little as expected.

Everytime a liberal says the right has forgotten we are "a nation of immigrants," that we've changed our attitude because the immigrants now have brown skin, just note that no, you changed.  You changed the contract between America and immigrants. We're not anti-immigrant, we're anti-YOU.

47 38 better take a look at who is getting all the PHDs in the USA now it is the foreign born not our own And muslims have a significantly higher income here than non muslims check out Allied Marketing's demographics muslims are like the new Jews all Doctors and Dentists

Posted by: archie bunker at October 05, 2010 10:06 AM (0YS61)

Why don't you have one of your muslim dentists fill that cavity between your ears vacuum skull?

48

There's a special category visa program for former Iraqi and Afghani interpreters, and I'm wholeheartedly in favor of that one. I know of at least four of my Iraqis who were killed in retaliation for helping us in the dark days of '06.

I've got another one of mine 2/3rds through the paperwork now.

 Posted by: SGT Dan at October 05, 2010 10:07 AM (QUuUE)

I could go with that.

49 We'll get it all worked out over the next 100 years, just like we did with the Catholics. Hope you weren't in a hurry.

-----------
Didn't some miraculous change agent recently point out that it took a hundred years to end slavery?

50 The pro-alien side always trots out the "we discriminated against Catholics" line without the least care about the long history of that prejudice. It started way back in the 16th century, during the Wars of Religion that accompanied the Reformation. Once Protestants got the upper hand in their lands, they were determined never to lose it again, and for good reason. In those days, when a king's decree could decide the official religion for the whole country, if the Wrong Sort got their hands on the levers of power, you and your family could suddenly find yourself slated for exile, poverty or even painful death. There was a very real fear that a return of Catholicism would bring with it bloody purges, and the fear was not groundless. The Catholic Church wasn't the little bleating lamb it is today - Popes were still rulers and even led armies, and belief in the rightness of the cause was fervent and uncompromising on both sides. In a way, Catholicism took the role that totalitarian Islam is filling for us today. The fear of falling under the power of an uncompromising, fanatical enemy lasted for centuries. It was about 300 years before Protestants were convinced that the fires of swordpoint conversion had gone out of their Catholic neighbours, and they began to be allowed back into politics. Three hundred years of good behaviour! And even today, some aren't convinced. Yet today, we're expected to invite unreformed, unrepentant, bloodthirsty Islam to sit down at the same table with us, when obviously these savages are generations away from being trusted even to eat with spoons, let alone knives. Let them serve their apprenticeship the way the Catholics did - 300 years of blameless existence, and then...we'll see.

51

I'm just saying that we don't need to feel obligated to continue acting as a "Nation of Immigrants" when that isn't an appropriate descriptor for much of the 20th century. Our policies should be based on today's needs and realities, not a reference to policies of the 18th and 19th centuries.

geoff, I wouldn't take the time to try to argue that our immigration policy is outdated, etc. You'd just get caught in the trap you mentioned, trying to defend 'a living constitution' stance.

I would argue that the old policy, immigration with assimilation, was fine. What changed was the Left's experiment with assimilation-less immigration. Let's declare that experiment a disaster and return to what worked.

The Left can't win by pointing to previous immigration waves. That undermines their argument, it doesn't strengthen it, but we have to point it out.

52 The pro-alien side always trots out the "we discriminated against Catholics" line without the least care about the long history of that prejudice.

That BS about "discriminating against Catholics" is like most of the libtard rhetoric, it is a lie. Nearly everyone in the country has been "discriminated against" at one time or another.

When the colonies were formed the myth that people came here for religious freedom is one more of the big lies. The people that came here to escape religious persecution came to set up their own preferred religion and kept out all others. Hell, some of the first people publicly executed were Quakers in MA guilty of the crime of being Quakers.

What is really funny is the evil slaveholders in SC at the time of the founding probably had the most diverse settlements in the religious category. That was one of the inducements that the Lord Proprietors used to attract settlers. Charleston used to have one of the largest Jewish settlements in North America.

53 45

Hmm, my family has been here since 1749.

Am I still considered an immigrant?

Posted by: BackwardsBoy at October 05, 2010 10:24 AM (3jxR/)

Yes!

(and Kudos to anyone who gets the historical reference)

54

Posted by: Vic at October 05, 2010 10:50 AM (/jbAw)

Yeah, it alsways cracked me up that some of the States who ratified the Constitution, had, and continued to have, a State Religion.... even after it was ratified...

Funny how THEY seemed to think the Constiution meant somthing different then how people want to interpret it today...

55 Wait...Muslims are immigrants? I thought Muslims helped found our country!

56

Funny how THEY seemed to think the Constiution meant somthing different then how people want to interpret it today...

Posted by: Romeo13 at October 05, 2010 10:53 AM (AdK6a)

That is because it did mean something different. The Bill of Rights only applied to the federal government then. There was no "incorporation". If I am not mistaken MA and RI still had State sponsored religions up to about 1850.

57

Yes, my ancestors were immigrants when they came here.  They were also something that Muslims weren't.  They were Pioneers.  They didn't come here to settle into the cities and form enclaves that shunned the culture of the people around them.

 

58 Wait...Muslims are immigrants? I thought Muslims helped found our country!

Posted by: PJ at October 05, 2010 10:54 AM (GK2JE)

I think you're confused. Muslims founded NASA. That's why Bolden is in Saudi Arabia right now, to discuss the new budget.

I think.

59

Anyone who thinks the Catholics were the only ones to take their turn in the barrel needs to look up what Lutherans went through during WWI.

German liturgy absolutely vanished. Church bulletins had to be submitted before mailing to federal censors, with translation if necessary. Changes in dogma and synodical structure were made, from within, under threat. Congregations and ministers were visited by spy-hunters--and, truth be told, they found a few. Where does one look for the Reformed Islamic Conference?

60 Thanks, Geoff, the chart was an eye opener for me. OTOH, I was in a good mood till I read the Globe "one world" drivel...

61 Sgt. Dan: I agree with you on that. Any man or woman who would put their life on the line for the US deserves naturalization, which is why I don't find that part of the DREAM Act objectionable (but we already hae that policy; it was in force when I was in the USN eons ago. The Phillippinos in the Navy enlisted, at least in part, to obtain US citizenship. Bully for them.

Heinlein had something when he postulated a future America where only veterans could vote.

62 I am so sick of dealing with stupid people....especially the ones that want more illiterate 3rd world peasants here

63 IP = 123.13.237.67

64

#55 - That was the Mexicans. 

 

65

Some good ideas here, and I would sign off in a heartbeat on Vic's program with the exception as per Sgt. Dan.

But then, I'm a (presumed) hopeless racist, zenophobe, nativist white male, so noone in charge of this asylum is exactly asking my opinion on anything like this.

66

America as the Immigrant Nation is a favorite theme of mine - the Land of Opportunity, where anyone can come and make their fortune, is an important part of our national character.  I take the Teddy Roosevelt view - anyone who wants to come and be an American is welcome to join us. 

I'm not in favor of those that want to come to America to be something else.  I've been around the world a couple of times, and we have the best country going.  Everybody else wants to live like an American, but they don't want to be like Americans.  They want to follow their old ways and do what their parents did, and they don't understand why they aren't rich like the Americans.  They want French work rules and Swedish social welfare programs, and then they don't understand why they can't get what they want.  You want to be a Mexican, go do it in Mexico.  You want to be an American, come on over. 

 

67 At this stage we need to massively curtail all immigration to digest and assimilate the people already here. Immigration from majority Muslim nations should be complete stopped.

We can make some exceptions for highly skilled and rich foreigners. But we need the poor, ignorant masses (of which there are billions) like we need another hole in our head.

68

A nation of immigrants must include Muslims

What, no love for the Aztecs and their religion? You wingnuts always get so exercised by the human sacrifice thing. It's part of their culture, and all cultures are equally valid, except white heterosexual American culture, which is reprehensible. What did it ever accomplish?

 

69 The false premise here is that post-Kennedy/1964 immigration = pre-Kennedy/1964 immigration.  It simply doesn't.  Pre-1964 immigration occurred in pulses, with periods of heavy immigration interrupted by pauses with practically no immigration, which encouraged assimilation and discouraged balkanization.  There was no daisy-chain immigration or right of family unification prior to 1964, which both encouraged cultural assimilation and screened for self-supporting immigrants.  In the 19th century especially, and to a lesser degree in the early 20th century, there was no government welfare for immigrants.  As a consequence, depending on the wave, up to 50% of immigrants in the 19th century returned to their home countries, sometimes for cultural reasons but more often for economic ones.  The ones who stayed were the ones who could support themselves in a competitive capitalist economy; to the limited extent there's any truth to the canard that "immigrants built this country," it necessarily refers to the ones who could hack it and support themselves.

In short, to all the people who glorify past immigration, I say "bring it on."  I'd vote for old-style immigration laws in a heartbeat.  But of course that's not what they're really talking about.

70

In short, to all the people who glorify past immigration, I say "bring it on."  I'd vote for old-style immigration laws in a heartbeat.  But of course that's not what they're really talking about.

Which was my  original point: It's not that the immigrants changed. We changed.

71 You know, immigration in many, many ways has and will continue to benefit America. It grows the economy, it keeps the population relatively young, it buttresses us for the future challenge China will inexorably pose. But not Muslim immigration. We don't need the 6th century immigrating to these shores. We don't need Sharia here. We don't need women to fear walking down any street without a shawl on, as though they were in that cesspool called Mecca. Personally, I'd like to see way more European immigration, from Northern Europe. Why? Because I want America to stay like the country I grew up in, and I don't want to grow old in a Latin American country... or a Middle Eastern shithole. No apologies. And if someone is offended: eff you, it's MY country.

72 Not long ago, America used to be a melting pot -- out of many, one. Now it's a tossed fruit salad -- out of many, many self-interested identity groups.

73

"This is based on the old canard that because the nation was founded by immigrants and continued to welcome large influxes of immigrants through its first 130 years, we must continue to honor that same ethic today."

I think you mean 230 years

74 I'm tired of the "America is exceptional" bullshit. America is exceptional for one reason only: it's my country. I don't care that America be a city on a shining hill. I love it because it's my city and my hill. It's shininess is secondary.

There are 7 billion people on planet earth. 6.7 billion of them live somewhere other than America. They live, eat, sleep, work, feed their families, raise their children and everything else. They don't need to live in America to do that. If a particular group of people is unwilling to live peacefully and lawfully alongside us then we don't have to let them in. We can keep them from coming for ANY reason. I would rather exclude Muslims than watch America deteriorate any further into a police state.

The Constitution makes no promises to foreigners of any kind: Europeans, Asians, Muslims, Sikhs, Christians or Jains. It makes a promise to one and only one particular group of people. It does so in the preamble: "in order to secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity..."

It makes its promise only to those people who are citizens, and to our children.

75 Unrestricted mass immigration has always been great for native born Americans. It worked awesomely for the Cherokee, Iroquois, Sioux, Arapahoe, Navajo, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Lakota, Ute...

76 This should be a no-brainer.

Simply bring back the loyalty oath. Anyone who wants to move here has to affirm their absolute loyalty to the U.S. Constitution and the principles of the Declaration of Independence. Just as we used to do with Communists, we should directly ask them if they desire to replace our constitutional government with something else, in the case of Muslims, shariah law. If they desire that sooner or later shariah should supplant our constitutional government, WE DON'T LET 'EM IN.

It's that simple.

77 Currently 60 percent of the inmates in French prisons are Muslims. That's despite the fact that hundreds of urban neighborhoods in France are now no-go zones for the police--i.e., the police literally do NOT enter them--because Muslim gangs rule those neighborhoods.

Also in France--those same Muslim gangs rape non-Muslim women unfortunate enough to cross their path, as well as Muslim girls who are not shrouded adequately enough to suit them. If the girl gets pregnant--or sometimes even if she doesn't, but it still somehow becomes know that she's been sexually violated--her male relatives, usually the father, can kill her, under shariah law, for injuring the family's "honor."

Only 12 percent of the French population is Muslim, and yet this is how bad things are already.

In Malmo, Sweden, the Muslim no-go zones are so bad that even AMBULANCES do not enter them without LARGE police escorts, because the gangs attack the EMTs. Real smart, huh?

In England, there are "honour killings," forced marriages, child marriages, genital mutilation of young girls, polygamy, and shariah courts to dispense "justice." Not for nought does Melanie Phillips call her hometown "Londonistan."

The number one way the Muslims plan to vanquish us is through gradually taking over our country. "Creeping shariah" is ongoing, and it includes infiltration of our government and military, which is already quite advanced. (e.g., John Brennan, Nidal Hassan) They are softening us up for the kill. Currently 30 Islamist paramilitary training camps exist in the United States.

NO MORE ISLAMISTS!!!!

78 Well said, Wilkey. Yes we may be more than a country and have certain ideals, but we're a country too.  A people.  We are flesh and blood human beings, we live in a certain place, and we have every right not to let it become the Third World by importing a few hundred million Third Worlders.

79 My wife would beg to differ about the whole immigrant-founding idea.

80

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