Discussion for article #243008
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Wow, a reasoned, reasonable proposal.
Has no chance passing the republicans, of course.
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““Let’s say France has had 2,000 people leave to go and fight [in Syria.] They’re a visa waiver country so the people come back to France and then they come into the United States. The bill we would propose would strictly limit that,” Feinstein told reporters on Wednesday, according to The Hill.”
So, who really thinks that anyone who intends to cause us harm after the Paris attacks will just saunter over to Syria ON RECORD so we can track it? Because clearly France isn’t already watching this travel. This build up of unnecessary bureaucracy will serve exactly no purpose. If you want to do this, then you have to get rid of Visa waivers, period.
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Sounds “reasonable”, except the Europeans who went to fight in Syria do not go there directly with their national passports. They travel to Turkey then slip into Syria/Iraq with or without fake passports… If this is the track Senate wants to follow, they shd simply suspend the visa waiver program & beef up the Global Entry traveler program that allows expedited clearance for pre-approved, low-risk travelers.
Still the GOP is ramping up demagoguery not because they care about security, but because this melee strokes their Bigotry erogenous zones a la Ebola frenzy last year that netted them electoral victories.
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Exactly.
This is just pandering by the Blue Dogs to appease the panicked, cowardly Americans who watch nothing but FOX News all day long.
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Ah just said same below. Thinking alike simultaneously.
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Calling Sen. Dianne Feinstein a “blue dog” is a bit silly. She isn’t one. This bill harms no one. It’s not likely to achieve much but its benign and well intentioned. It’s a proposal that has some bipartisan support but that doesn’t mean it deserves knee jerk condemnation from folks that call themselves Liberals.
I am from Europe and can comfortably say this bill will be well received by the European community. It targets a European’s history and not just the fact that he or she is European. Similar legislation is already in effect in the EU.
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In addition, the Rethugs are desperate to shut the government down and they will probably do it via this issue. POTUS will veto any bill that makes it even more onerous on refugee checks.
First, it was Planned Parenthood, now it’s this. They think this is a winning issue amongst a majority of the country. Personally, I don’t think it is.
It’s not a knee jerk reaction. It will require even more resources to accomplish exactly nothing new. It’s not benign because it takes resources away from doing something effective, like expediting refugee clearance. It’s a political gambit and replicates already existing programs.
EDIT: Make no mistake, and Feinstein knows this, the intelligence agencies are already tracking these people. It’s not the people who are publicly crossing borders that present a problem.
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It’s not benign because it takes resources away from doing something effective, like expediting refugee clearance.
Except expediting refugee clearance isn’t going to happen. It’s not politically feasible at this point. I agree that this is a fig leaf but the fact is that many in the country are afraid right now. They’re not listening to reason. Since the Rethugs are going to shutdown the gov’t over this, the Dems have to have something else to offer.
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Senators,
Are you serious? Do you really believe a European needs to travel to a hotspot country to learn how to make a bomb, fire a weapon, or fly a plane well enough to crash it?
Disagree. Visa Waiver is a very important program-- both ways. As an American, do you really want to have to go to the French Embassy to get a visa for a week’s vacation?
Because if you suspend the program, they do on the other side also.
Reasonable checks and balances like this will weed out some. And security agencies should be able to track on many of the others.
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“the visa waiver program potentially is the place where there’s greater gaps possibly than the refugee program itself,”
Considering that every one of the Paris attackers identified so far was a European national: Duh!
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The feckless bozos who support illegals are unable to consider even a single illegal to be a danger. Rather, any “refugee illegal” cannot be questioned because they are illegals, and illegals are good. This is the perversion of thought and reason that passes for liberal dogma these days.
If it moves the focus of the debate from xenophobia towards Syrians to European nationals then it will have served a purpose.
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You have no idea how the screening system ALREADY works. It takes at least 18 - 24 months to get clearance to come here as a refugee (particularly as a Syrian refugee). They undergo background checks, biological checks (like iris scans) and home country reference checks of which only about 50% pass. Once that’s ALL DONE, only a small percentage of those who pass actually get resettlement clearance.
These are not the people coming here to create sleeper cells.
I think you need to quit watching Fox News.
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If you’re going to accuse me of idiotically lying and contradicting facts shouldn’t you present some…you know…facts?
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That’s fair.
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Sleeper cells in EU is what I meant.
I’m kind of amazed that your reality blinders have missed the news for the last 5 days:
A Syrian passport found by police at the scene of the mass shooting in a Paris concert hall belonged to an asylum seeker who registered on a Greek island in October, a Greek minister said Saturday.
“We confirm that the Syrian passport holder came through the Greek island of Leros on October 3 where he was registered under EU rules,” said a statement issued by Nikos Toskas, the minister for citizen protection.
That’s from the Times of Israel, but 40-50 papers have the same info. At least 1, possibly 2, are Syrian terrorists who came in with the economic migrant invasion in October.