GeorgiaDon

You helped a family member through the process. I stated in my earlier post that being sponsored by a family member who is a US citizen is by far the most common mechanism people use to legally immigrate. However we were discussing people fleeing oppressed countries, and illegal immigrants in general. When you say such people should use legal avenues, and hold up your stepmother as an example, you are being disingenuous. I am sure you are well aware that very few of those people have access to the three routes of legal immigration: sponsorship by a qualified family member, sponsorship by an employer and possession of technical skills that are deemed to be needed in the US economy, or having $500,000 to invest in US businesses. Certainly the kid fleeing drug war violence in Guatemala (as one example) is unlikely to have either $500,000 or advanced technical skills. When that kid shows up at the US border, what do you really mean when you say "follow the law"? Does it make any difference to you if you consider that the conditions in Guatemala are a consequence of US meddling in the Guatemalan government, support for the military dictatorship there, and ongoing financial support for drug gangs (a result of the US being the number 1 market for their products)? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

You didn't "ask what I advocate", you accused me of favoring illegal immigration. Perhaps where you come from you ask questions by putting words in people's mouths. In my experience, when people say illegal immigrants should "follow the law" to come to this country, they assume that legal channels exist and illegals just prefer to bypass them. My comment was intended to point out that for most people such channels for legal immigration do not exist. I now realize that you were aware of this, and when you say people fleeing war, drug gangs, etc should "follow the law" that's just turtle code for "I don't give a fuck about anybody else, y'all should just stay in your shithole and die". Personally, I think US immigration policy needs to be redone ASAP, with an emphasis on creating legal avenues for welcoming people who want to work, even if it is in jobs such as picking crops. I think it is incredibly hypocritical to depend on the illegal immigrant workforce to produce our crops (and other goods and services) while simultaneously vilifying such people for not following a legal process that does not exist. It would also be a good idea if the US stopped making a habit of conducting proxy wars, installing dictators, and generally working to undermine the economies of Central and South American countries, and indeed everywhere in the world. When you examine why countries such as Guatemala and El Salvador are such basket cases, you don't have to dig too far to find US fingerprints. In many other cases, it is the combination of US demand for illicit drugs with US drug policy that is keeping the drug cartels in business. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

How do you define "exceptional"? If you mean it is a country that offers a decent chance (but no guarantee) at a good standard of living if you are willing to work for it, and a fairly substantial freedom to make your own choices, then the US is exceptional. If you mean it is a country that offers these things to a significantly greater degree than any other country on the planet, I'd have to disagree. If you mean it is a country that was chosen by God to be perfect in every way, so that nothing it does could ever be wrong, or that it is so perfect that nothing could be learned by looking at other countries, I'd strongly disagree. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

However, the law says that there is no legal avenue of immigration available to the vast majority of people from oppressed countries. There are very few ways left to legally immigrate to the US. You can be sponsored by a family member who is a US citizen, such as your spouse or sibling; most who do immigrate come here under this (family reunification) program. Other than that, you can be sponsored for a green card by an employer if you have certain advanced technical skills and your employer has searched and been unable to find a qualified American for the job. You can also buy your way in by investing a minimum of $500,000 in USCIS-approved businesses. Your starving Irish potato farmer would find the door shut if the potato blight were to hit today, unlike the situation in the 1840s. For all but a privileged few (disclaimer: that includes me) "follow the law" means "the way is shut". Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Statements like this are founded on the assumption that police stops are (or should be) comparable to a random sampling of the population, so any one individuals chance of being stopped is exactly the same as any other individual. Of course, the ACLU would also be upset if the police actually did stop people at random, with no reason other than "today it's just your turn". It is of course possible that some conscious or unconscious bias is at work. It is also possible that certain demographics are disproportionately likely to present valid reasons to be pulled over. These could include things like no tail lights, cracked windshield, no license plate, driving with headlights off after dark, speeding, excessively loud music, and so on, up to driving a vehicle that matches the description of a suspect vehicle near to where a crime has been reported. In my city we have a "no cruising" ordinance in the downtown area, which allows police to ticket you if they see you drive around the block more than twice within 10 minutes. I think it's a dumb law, as you may just be looking for a place to park, but it was intended to discourage "cruising". A lot of these things are (it seems to me) related to poverty; people with little money drive old worn out cars and may not have money to immediately fix a burned out headlight or a cracked windshield. Some of them are, frankly, related to age and cultural attitudes, such as playing music so loud the bass makes you think there is an earthquake happening and you are five cars back from the source of the noise. As we all know there is a relationship between wealth and race in this country. Where I live (college town) it seems most of the white kids are college students whose parents have provisioned them with a car worth about ten time what I can afford as a mere professor. If you see a 1970s era ragged-out Cadillac with one headlight, no functioning backup lights, no plates (except maybe an obviously ancient "Tag Applied For"), the hood held down with a piece of rope, and shiny new chrome hubcaps, the odds are overwhelming that the driver will be black. A stereotype for sure, but one you can see every day around here. Who is more likely to be pulled over, the person driving the old Cadillac with a half-dozen safety violations, or the person driving a fresh off the lot Lexus? It is possible that there is a bias at work driving the police to target minorities. I just don't think you can say that so definitively based on nothing other than a comparison to the demographic makeup of the population. I think you would have to actually examine the probable cause for the stops. You could also do an experiment, such as have white or black drivers drive the same vehicle with the same red flags around town for similar amounts of time. If the black drivers get pulled over more often than the white drivers do, driving the same vehicle in the same neighborhoods, then you would have a strong argument that bias was at work. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Another great Republican plan to grow the economy! Foreign tourists spent $222 billion dollars in the US in 2014, and supported 8 million US jobs (source). I'm sure that number will only go up when tourists find out they have to wear a tracking device. Nothing says "welcome to America" like a radio collar or being micro-chipped. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Perhaps you would prefer someone who treated soldiers as cannon fodder? I hear such a person is available, he spends his time hanging around his ranch in Texas producing so-so paintings. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Be careful what you wish for. The only people who are in the US and are not "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" are foreign diplomats who enjoy diplomatic immunity. And yes, if their children are born here my understanding is that they do not become US citizens. If you play this card with undocumented immigrants (or illegal aliens if you prefer) you are saying that the laws of the US do not apply to them. Such people could even commit murder and they could not be prosecuted. Personally I think creating a class of people who are exempt from US law, just to cut off their anchor babies, would be inviting a much worse problem than we already have. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

On one hand you have a point, on the other, you weren't there, so you don't know what happened, of if pressure was applied to "adjust" requirements unofficially.Was Ronhend there? The guy who wrote the article? Anyone else in this thread who responded in the negative? Some, at least, had the guption to admit they may have jumped to a conclusion. It seems some people simply cannot believe that two women could possibly have honestly achieved something that was too tough for 287 men to do. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

It's pretty disgusting that so many people were unable to conceive of the possibility that a woman might have actually passed the course by her own merit. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Kind of makes me wonder what would happen if Louisiana were to put some resources behind educating their population instead of jailing them. But perhaps that would be seen as coddling the criminals (or people who are destined to become criminals, because that's just what those people do [as per post #1 of this whole thread]). Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

I disagree. Kicking in the back door of someones house while they are in bed sleeping to steal an xbox and a flat screen is not something to dismiss. I've not seen any post suggesting such a crime is "something to dismiss". Can you point that one out to me? I really do not understand why many people (some here apparently) can only grasp two alternatives: life without parole or "dismiss". There really is a wide range of possibilities in between. I have no problem with ratcheting up the punishment for "slow learners", but life without parole for a repeat petty offender offers them no opportunity to learn from their mistakes, and is horrendously expensive for society. "Three strikes" laws and similar "get tough on crime" approaches are certainly politically expedient, but they are laughably simple minded, based on a ridiculous premise, are generally corrosive to society, and usually stem from a mindset that actually contributes to the root causes of crime. They are simple minded because they assume that criminals are adept at planning for the future and make decisions based on long-term interests. They also assume that repeat criminals have a wealth of alternative opportunities that they carefully consider and then reject. They are all stick and no carrot. They are corrosive and counterproductive because they divert huge amounts of money into the prison system and away from factors that could actually help reduce crime, such as good schools and support for infrastructure to encourage businesses and job creation. It's perverse IMO, that many politicians (and the voters who support them) object to spending money on education, after-school programs to give kids something to do (instead of hanging out and getting into trouble), public transit to help people get to work, etc, but have no limit to the amount of money they are willing to commit to jailing people. Also our habit of criminalizing every transgression (except those generally enjoyed by people with money) has created a whole subculture where kids grow up without a decent male role model because they are all in jail or on probation. Those same politicians have killed almost all funding for education or job training for inmates, as part of their fervor for "punishment". Often, as well, they make it almost impossible for inmates to actually get a job and support themselves once they are released. Here in Georgia, for example, felons are barred for life from receiving any state license related to employment. The list of occupations for which you must have some sort of a state license is very comprehensive; as a convicted felon you cannot ever be a barber or beautician, any sort of a contractor, a teacher or a doctor or a lawyer, and on and on. If you are lucky you may find a menial job at minimum wage, but even there employers are reluctant to hire anyone with a record, in part because they fear lawsuits and in part because they risk being barred from bidding on government contracts. Legislators would do well to consider the factors that tend to lead to successful non-criminal lives, and at least try to stop interfering in those factor. I would include: Kids raised in households with two parents (gender does not matter), or strong support available for single parents. Affordable access to excellent education at all levels, with a wide variety of career training available. Everyone needs something beyond high school these days, but that does not have to mean only university, there will always be a demand for mechanics, plumbers, electricians etc so good community colleges should be available to every community. Public investment in infrastructure to attract and keep good employers. This does not mean tax handouts to attract business. However all businesses want to see a decent pool of educated potential employees, good schools and services (so they can attract and keep quality employees), efficient (and safe) transit to ensure employees can get to and from work, and so on. All these things take thought, hard work, and a willingness to make investments in the long-term needs of the community. However they can work and pay off in the long run. On the other hand, simplistic knee-jerk "all stick, no carrot" prison-oriented approaches have a consistent track record of failure. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

It seems that in Missouri if you have been convicted of two theft-related offenses within the previous 10 years then any new theft is considered a felony, regardless of the value of the stolen goods (link). This is the kind of thing that results in people being sentenced to life for stealing a slice of pizza. Another issue is that many states have not updated their felony statutes for many years, so minimum dollar amounts that seemed serious 50 years ago are still the threshold today. In Missouri the threshold is $500, but there is a long list of specific items (animals/livestock, firearms, US flags, etc) that automatically are treated as felonies regardless of value. It's a lot more likely that any thief will face a felony charge today than they would have for stealing the exact same item 20 or 30 years ago, just because of inflation. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

How is this different from what every defendant who is not a police officer already has to go through? We just had a trial for a guy who was accused of shooting two police officers, killing one and critically injuring the other, as well as killing another person just to "send a message" to a friend of that person. Every detail of the evidence was so publicized in the local media far in advance of the trial that a jury had to be brought in from another county, to have a hope of finding jurors who had not already made up their minds. There is (I think) an inherent conflict between freedom of the press and people's right to a fair trial. Historically we seem to have decided that the free press takes precedence. Why should the police be treated any differently than everybody else? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

So consistent I sometimes suspect he is actually just a computer program running a very simpleminded if/then routine. Maybe just someone's long running psychology experiment, and we are all just rats in a maze so to speak. I do wonder how (and why) they programmed it to disregard any semblance of proper spelling, or sentence structure. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

The EPA definitely screwed this one up. However, we should not lose sight of the fact that the "toxic orange wastewater" mess they were trying to clean up was created by a mining company that had walked away, and left the mess for someone else to deal with. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

So now you're blaming the military for Obama? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Santorum? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Not a very convincing dodge to the question. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

And yet, you are totally unable to provide a link to the alleged offending post. I wonder why? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Is this how Canada deals with people convicted of murder? I don't think so. In the US you can easily be convicted of murder without actually killing anyone. All you have to do is be a party to a crime in which someone ends up getting killed. Example from where I live: college kid asks his friend for a drive so he can pick up some weed, a small amount for personal use (not dealing). At the buy, the person selling the weed instead pulls a gun and robs the college kid, then shoots him. Friend brings college kid to the hospital but college kid is already dead. Friend is charged with felony murder because he drove the college kid to the drug buy, and is sentenced to life (with the possibility of parole after 25 years). Do you think the friend should be executed for what he did? Locked up for life and never let out? Back to the background check issue, there are a lot of crimes less than murder that still suggest a person should not be allowed to own guns for at least a significant amount of time after their release. Would you say that every person convicted of brandishing a weapon during a robbery should be executed, or locked up for life? If not, then they will be released one day and we still have the issue of whether or not they should be allowed to walk into a gun shop and buy whatever they want. rushmc is OK with that, what do you think? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

I think some in this forum should have background checks before they can post And to your question. They will get guns regardless. They dont follow lawsSome people still drive drunk. Therefore, we should do away with DUI laws? Some people commit murder. Therefore, we should not bother to outlaw murder? Perhaps we should only have laws against things nobody ever does. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

What???? That kind of "logic" could be used to justify killing anyone, any time. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Agreed I don't agree, and that is not what I was saying. The video does not indicate his arm was in the car when it started moving, or that he was being dragged. Even if his arm was in the window it was not trapped and it would have been a simple move to pull back. Like all incidents, this one was the result of a series of decisions. I think the cop made reasonable decisions up until the point where the guy started to drive away. Others seem to think (as far as I can tell) that the bad decisions started with the decision to pull the guy over. I am a bit curious (or maybe just bored at work) about how not enforcing license laws (both vehicle and driver) is supposed to work out, aside from the fact that in this specific instance the guy would be alive and the cop wouldn't be in jail. I suspect that people don't really mean exactly what they are saying, they (like everybody) are just pissed off that incidents like this keep happening. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

That would be cool. Have a great weekend, all. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)