FAIR*(Washington, D.C.) Thirty House Republicans joined with Democrats to defeat two amendments to the Defense Appropriations bill that would have essentially blocked illegal aliens who have benefited from President Obama’s unlegislated amnesty program, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), from enlisting in the military. The amendments, offered by Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) and Steve King (R-Iowa), were defeated by the narrowest of margins, 210-211 and 207-214 respectively.
“In defeating the Gosar and King amendments, the Republican leadership has once again betrayed the voters who sent them to Washington to serve as a bulwark against President Obama’s abuse of executive authority, particularly in the area of immigration,” stated Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). “Many of the same Washington Republicans who have called DACA and other executive amnesty programs unconstitutional have now voted to allow the illegal aliens who benefit from these unlegislated amnesties to enlist in the military and get on a fast track to citizenship.” read more
Ok. Someone please tell me again why I should be loyal to the Republican party.
Sometimes the message isn’t clear. For example a lot of people were up in arms about Trump’s recent meeting with the NRA, not having any idea what the gist of the discussion but inferring the worst. In this case, given that DACA is illegal in itself, I might well argue that legislation such as this would lend it some validity and that ignoring it is a better path.
On the other hand there are certainly some limp GOP members of the House.
Another day another Republican betrayal!
Yes, the GOP sucks, but lets replace it, not simply destroy it. Having a R majority in both Houses is imperative in 2016.
I don’t know the specifics of this bill, yet I am confident I have the general gist of it. I would also like to think the members of this forum are capable of handling disagreement as reasonable adults if it comes to that.
I’m okay with the idea of illegal aliens using military enlistment as a path to US citizenship. Perhaps the specifics of this bill are bad and I am ignorant to how bad those specifics are. However, I remain wide open to the general idea. It exposes them to multiple years of a form of naturalization, if not a perfect one. We invest in them and they invest in us. Win/win.
Do we have the capacity to forgive? Can we not interpret how illegal aliens enlisting in the military is a reflection of how they acknowlege they’ve screwed up in the past and have decided upon a healing path forward that will correct the mistakes they made?
Granted, there have been and will be anomalies who harbor malicious intent and they certainly will game the system. Nidal Hasan is the poster child for that. However, we cannot engage in the practice of pre-crime and smear all illegal aliens with our incorrect preconceived perceptions of malicious intent. Doing that is not unlike how the left want to use the terror watch list and other similar tools as a means to deny citizens due process and their second amendment right.
We need to trust in the infrastructure we have to weed those people out and we must tweak that infrastructure when sensible and necessary. What we cannot do is paint with the broad brush and categorically deny entire swaths of people. We are conservatives. We are better than this.
Please respectfully engage me on how rawng I am if that is your opinion.
@mrimmortalfish – I just can’t buy any argument for ‘sorry I broke the law, but can I just stay anyway?’ And a crucial reason is that it encourages more people to break the law. People are dying by the thousands trying to get to Europe and into the US because they see that the laws keeping them out are being ignored by the leaders of the land. That causes more misery and death than proper implementation of the laws.
Say my father successfully robbed jewelry stores for many years. He was very good at his “job”, had a reliable fence to convert this illegal activity into “clean” cash. Our immediate family benefited from his labors and my sister and I became accustom to the lifestyle the money brought. Then, one terrible night that threatens to break up our family, he was caught. The authorities arrested him and intend to lock him up for several years. My mother is heartbroken and my sister and I worry we will never see him in good health again. Surly the compassionate will recognize he was only taking advantage of an opportunity and did not really mean to harm anyone. What is to become of our family and way of life if he is incarcerated? How will my poor mother carry on? And what is to become of our house, cars and other luxuries his “work” provided?
Sure, keep goods kids out of the military because of grades, but let in lawbreakers who have no sense of property rights (seeing as how they are trespassers) and teach them how to use guns and blow shit up.
If they lead a Forlorn Hope in battle and survive, they may stay.
I only want patriots serving in our military. Not some third world entitled libtard counting down the days until his “oppression and forced slavery” is over.
And we don’t need sleepers to turn on their fellow soldiers like that Nidal Hassan goat molester
speaking of the gop doing their job, here is a recent quote from paul ryan, commenting that he would sue trump over the muslim immigration issue
“i would sue any president that exceeds his or her powers”
yet this asshole has done nothing to stop obama
correct me if i am wrong
Obama, and his fellow pukes, have changed the purpose of the military so drastically that it no longer is a force for national protection but a medium for anti-American social programming! enlisting Illegals, alongside queers, trannies, and girls was just the next planned step in its proposed decline and ultimate failure in a dangerous world!
@leftcoastdan – Your reply fails to acknowledge how I described this is a two-way street. We are not talking about the illegal aliens getting EBT cards and Obeymephones. We are talking about the illegal aliens that are headed to Parris Island. Where you see the same one group of people, I see two very different groups of people. It is rawng to consider them all one and the same for the aforemented reasons in my earlier post.
Why have prisons and rehabilitation if we have no capacity to forgive after someone has served out their sentance? Let’s just shoot everyone in the head right in the courtroom once they are sentenced if we cannot bear that capacity to forgive and move on after they have committed years of their lives to acheive that forgiveness. Again, we are not talking about people that are continuing to absorb all the benefits of our system without giving anything back. We are talking about people that have made a conscious decision to set the ship upright and give of themselves.
If illegal aliens willing to sacrifice multiple years of their lives and expose themselves to a form of naturalization is a way of confusing even more of them to break our immigration laws only to join the military, sacrifice multiple years of their lives, and thus gain that naturalization… then, yes, I do invite more of it.
There have been illegals (who were gang members, but you know how people look the other way) in the military who joined simply because they wanted to use it as a training tool to fight the rival street gangs in LA. They even admit this when they get caught doing stupid shit in the military or out on the street. You don’t know the person’s intentions if you don’t know their background. That’s the same problem we have with the muslims we import on purpose.
People without a background cannot pass a background check.
@mrimmortalfish – I do understand the distinction. I understand why people brave hardship to come to this country, for the opportunities it provides even absent the free stuff. But there is a limit to what we can provide, and we have immigration policy which governs that. Illegal is illegal. I am happy to forgive them – if they acknowledge that what they did was illegal, and then honor that by going home. By staying they show disregard for our laws.
: , I ain’t seeing it – how your statement could wrong.
What if our country was already conquered and nobody bothered to tell us yet?
If, during a time of declared war, if from their native country and if they pledge allegiance to the US, then they can serve and receive the benefits form serving.
Hey, what else are you going to do with those military-aged jihadi immigrants?
This is why I am considering voting for Trump–in the hopes that he will be the death of the Republican party and something better can rise from the ashes. I am sick and tired of voting for people who have an R after their name, only to have my values betrayed again and again.
When I joined the Navy at the end of August in 1972, we had a Jordanian guy in my company in boot camp. I could never figure why he was there in the first place. I don’t know what happened to him after boot camp, all I remember he was the hairiest bastard that I ever met and was give special permission to not have to shave like the rest of us because he had to shave at least twice a day. Even the political correctness in its infancy was creeping into the Navy.
The term, “House Republican”, is taking on a whole new meaning to me, similar to the South pre-Civil War term, “House Slave”.
Am I being fair in my equivalency here? Or am I doing a disservice to the Slaves of the past?
Anybody have the names of the 30 traitors?
@Tony R – Here’s the list – republicrat traitors names are in plain text in the “noes” column (communists names are in italics):
http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2016/roll317.xml
Breitbart has a good article on the vote:
http://www.breitbart.com/2016-presidential-race/2016/06/17/30-gop-reps-join-pelosi-democrats-voting-pentagons-backdoor-amnesty/
Gosh. Censorship?! I am truly fascinated to see that my earlier posts were censored. I had honestly considered IOTW to be one of the few genuine places remaining where rational discourse could play out. Absolutely no clue what I wrote qualified for censoring. I’m prolly wasting my time writing this now as this post may also be automatically censored too. Let’s find out.
The liberal/progressives tell us, “We need a fast-track to citizenship.”
I honestly thought the conservative stock answer to that was, “We already have one. They can join the military.”
And now you guys censor me for echoing that. Wow. Just wow.