@zoosermom, Haha. Your post reminds me that a previous President (some may call him “dictator” to some degree) in Singapore once said he prefers that only the mature, older, married citizens are allowed to vote (or their votes are weighted more.) I think that in his days, he had a genuine concern that the young men (either communist sympathizers or just muslims? I think his political base back them were mostly ethnic Chinese) could create all sorts of problems for his government which controls the country with an iron’s wrist. He actually did not buy into the whole democracy thing from the western world but it seems he still managed to give many of his fellow countrymen a good life – as long as they are not against him politically. (Hmmm… Maybe Iraqis had had a better life under the dictator Hussein before we tried to “liberate” them!)
That’s why I said it would be a disaster to settle refugees in the rust belt.
No jobs mean idle men = trouble.
@mcat2, parts of China already have a labor shortage and rapidly rising wages thanks to the one-child policy.
BTW, I know that St. Louis wants immigration (otherwise, it faces a stagnant/declining population). It took in a bunch of refugees a decade ago and has a thriving Bosnian community now.
Expect many Syrians to go to the Detroit area, which already has a lot of people of Arab descent.
@GMTplus7, immigrants also create.
For example, most grocery stores in Detroit are Arab-owned. They’re going in to rough crime-ridden areas to serve a mostly African-American clientele that would otherwise be neglected by major chains.
Insight reporting from Megan McArdle (who’s libertarian) on the refugees: http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-09-24/dispatch-from-lesbos-syrian-refugees-are-not-defeated
I urge everyone on this thread to read it.
@Bay, how would refugees from Syria and Afghanistan pick up visas to come to the US? Walk me through the specifics, please. Then where would they board a plane for the US?
“The modern-day pioneers striving toward Europe shouldn’t have to beg for a chance to build productive lives in Germany or Britain or the U.S. We should be going out to invite them in. We should have started much sooner.”
Unbelievable. I am sure Megan is planning to house many of them in her modest abode in Washington, DC and share her income with them.
Germany is running out of housing for the refugees so they are throwing this woman out of her apartment of 16 years.
There are also proposals to take vacant private apartments from landlords and vacant commercial property. (Whether the government is going to pay market rates for this takeover wasn’t addressed in the article).
The article also says there are some calling for refugees to be billeted with individual families.
The mayor of Los Angeles just signed a letter saying that LA would take Syrian refugees. Last week he declared homelessness a “crisis” in Los Angeles.
There are people living under the overpasses, in tarps on Skid Row and in motorhomes without running water or toilets on the streets of Venice. These are American citizens with no place decent to live, but somehow there are places for Syrians?
Just to note: most of the small grocers in Detroit have for some decades been Chaldean, meaning Iraqi Christian.
Post #388, on the radio, they said there doesn’t seem to have enough housing for veterans to rent, hence lots of homeless veterans. We don’t take care of our people. Even people with housing vouchers can’t find housing. Just recently I saw a homeless white female changing underwear while standing up, this was near my work. SF is full of homeless people that my kid, who rode the public transportation the whole summer, was sick of the place.
@DrGoogle, well, the SF government gives homeless people money, so no wonder they go there.
If cities really need immigrants, the government should make it open to anyone in the world and pick the ones who’ll be best suited, and you can be sure there’ll be enough takers. Why should the pool be restricted to those who decide to break in and demand to go to the front of the line.
http://news.yahoo.com/germany-sees-many-migrants-falsely-claiming-syrian-141438842.html?bcmt=1443210355202-603c3e89-5b20-470d-83cc-8436ff88f62d&bcmt_s=u
The bulk of the crowd invading Europe are doing it for economic reasons and using any excuse they can get to bolster their case.
At one time, when my wife went to a grocery store, she saw an apparently homeless white female lying on the floor on the curb close to the entrance of that grocery store. She was crying very loudly while covering her face with something. She was not begging for anything. It was a very sad scene.
Another time, there were a family of 4 (husband and wife, and two young kids) who were standing/sitting close to the entrance of the same grocery store begging for anything. It was also very sad especially when two young kids were involved. The two young kids were very quiet; they likely sensed their parents had a trouble.
Not sure why the homeless people and beggars are always near that grocery store (Sprouts), not the other two grocery stores that we may shop also.
I think as of today, the country that I immigrated from do not have so many homeless beggars – even though their GDP is much lower than US’s… (However, when I was a child, there were some. But it seems there are none of such people as far as I could tell the last time I went there.)
These people were not begging. Dressed much more normal in a sundress. Only I paid attention to one and was wondering what’s going on and then realized this person was homeless. I saw many on this street I go home every day. None of them were begging.
Why would any city invite in more destitute people when there aren’t enough shelters to take care of the homeless people we already have. (And yes, I know many of the homeless do not want to live in the shelters because of the rules). But there are others who would love to have a place to live. There are people in No Cal who lost their homes in the fires and are living in tents. We need to take care of American citizens first and then and only then take in refugees.
@DrGoogle, The family of 4 (husband and wife, and two young kids) were indeed beggars. The husband held a sign and asked for helps. The wife and the two young kids sat nearby. Just wondering: If they indeed have the hardship, could the social services take the young kids away and take them (the kids) to a shelter and feed/clothe them? It seems this family was evicted from their apartment due to unemployment (at least it was written as such on the cardboard sign.)
At another time, I saw an old woman (maybe 70 yo?) walking near that grocery store (not inside the store) with all of her belongings on a shopping cart. It looks like she had not had a bath for a long time.
I think that, even inside our country, we have many who may have a dire need of help.
The nice stuff (sarcasm) that these people bring to Europe that the lib media in this country will not mention in its full glory:
It will be interesting when German (and European overall) women realize that they will have to give back freedoms that they supposedly enjoy like men. It is going to happen, as these two cultures are so vastly different, and one is much stronger than the other in imposing its beliefs.
My D lives and works in Germany. She teaches at a public community college/HS and works as a performing artist. I spoke with her this morning and we chatted about the situation. The town she lives in is relatively small (around 75000)and since it is in the former eastern bloc it is relatively conservative. She has two new Syrian girls in her class and they are both anxious to learn and assimilate. She has also signed up with the local government to act as a volunteer liaison with new immigrants, since they almost all speak English. Since she is fluent in German she is helping them navigate the complex German visa system, helping them with simple tasks like shopping and just working to ease their way through German habits and customs. Virtually all of the Syrian immigrants that she has met are educated middle and upper middle class people who have lost everything. The Germans in general do not all agree with the shear number of people coming in but her German friends genuinely feel that this is a chance for their country to step up to the plate and in a sense grab a little redemption. They are concerned about retaining their culture and language but they feel the faster that they work on assimilation the better off both sides will be. And gangs of Muslim youth roaming the streets? That gave her a very good laugh. More like gangs of neo nazi skin heads roaming the streets looking for Muslim kids to beat up.
In her little town she knows of at least seven families who have brought refugees right into their homes. Ten years ago D lost her apartment and possessions in a natural disaster and for a brief time knew what it was to be a “refugee”. She had to depend on the kindness of strangers and now it’s her chance for a bit of payback. Though I surely understand that her experiences are not universal, they in no way reflect the sort of “broad brush” stories on the internet that only serve to create anxiety and xenophobia.
BTW, even my blonde haired blue eyed D has had to deal with the skin heads and there yells of “auslander raus”!