USA Trump on Muslims

Ruth said:

Do you agree or disagree with the Donald about banning all Muslims from entering the USA? Many say it is antireligion to do so and against all this country stands for but I am scared of the Muslims and have to give this idea some thought.

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Would you ban all men from entering the US on the basis that the attackers on 9/11 were all men?

There's no need to be afraid of Muslims as a whole, just like there's no reason to be afraid of black people, or men, or children, or any other group you could identify. To assume that all Muslims are dangerous because of the actions of a few makes no more sense than to assume all Christians are nutjobs because of the antics of groups like Westboro Baptist Church.

bill1231 said:

The ban he prposed was temporary till this country can get its act together on vetting people responsibly so that noone will enter that wants to do us harm, personally I find the proposal to bge common sense

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How would you identify Muslims? Does Trump want to bar Muslims of any race (you can't always tell a Muslim by sight) or is he just about young men with brown skin and beards?

bill1231 said:

If they are properly vetting people you would know although it seems like they cant identify people who have been radicalized. The requirements need to be more stringent. Even the government recognizes this as the program that granted her entry is being re vamped as we speak so his idea is not that far out there as they are already in the process of doing it with that particular program

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So how do you tell if the white man from Frankfurt is a Muslim or not? This sort of extreme knee jerk reaction will keep the masses of moderate Muslims out while doing little to nothing to bar the few dangerous ones.

Ruth said:

Do you agree or disagree with the Donald about banning all Muslims from entering the USA? Many say it is antireligion to do so and against all this country stands for but I am scared of the Muslims and have to give this idea some thought.

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OK this is really something to think about. I started the would you trust thread because I am so conflicted about trusting the motives of the Islamic religion.

bill1231 said:

Bottom line is we need to be able to delve into the background and know, if we cant do that then we have no business letting them in. It is not bad if we have a stringent system in place to make sure of who iscoming in

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How much time do you propose to spend vetting each and every tourist, knowing the dangerous ones will probably come in through a tunnel or ride with a coyote from Mexico?

bill1231 said:

Bottom line is we need to be able to delve into the background and know, if we cant do that then we have no business letting them in. It is not bad if we have a stringent system in place to make sure of who iscoming in

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How much time do you propose to spend vetting each and every tourist, knowing the dangerous ones will probably come in through a tunnel or ride with a coyote from Mexico?

bill1231 said:

Whatever it takes and we could make the border a lot harder to cross without the proper paperwork

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It doesn't keep the coyotes out now. What happens when tourists don't bother coming and vast numbers of Americans working in tourist related industries end up unemployed? And all to keep out a group of people that are almost entirely harmless.

Would you also want to stop white people with blonde hair and blue eyes from visiting, in case they are the next Timothy McVeigh?

A temporary halt of incoming isn't a bad idea and should not harm any tourist industries I would think. It's kinda like when a teacher makes the entire class put their heads down because one or two kids acted up, and even though we all hated it, it did give teacher a time to sort things out.

I heard about the Japanese interment camps during WWII. I do not want to see citizens of our country treated like that.And please remember the Jews in Nazi Germany. We have a lot of Muslim Americans. And though I am conflicted about whether to trust them,I believe in our Declaration of Independence. And unless, as Americans, no longer believe or hold these truths that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. That among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, we should really examin e ourselves stringently. As a Christian, I would not like to be persecuted for my beliefs. The Word of God tells us to do unto others as we would have others do unto us.Our country let other religious beliefs thrive here. We did not close off admittance to any people group. Now we are in a pickle. I don't see an answer. And the Donald's answer seems wrong somehow, even though to an extent I agree in part with it. But the incidents I mentioned regarding the Japanese and the Jews give me pause.

bill1231 said:

Slice it any way you want it, muslims or at least a portion of them are at war with us, when will people realize this and take reasonable steps to protect themselves and others. What, we do nothing because we are afraid of aoffending someone? That is nopnsense

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A tiny proportion of Muslims are at war with us. A tiny proportion of men are violent rapists. A tiny proportion of business executives are fraudsters. A tiny proportion of white people are criminals. A tiny proportion of brown people are criminals. A tiny proportion of yellow people are criminals. Should we block them all, just in case?

Sadly a tiny proportion of Americans are violent, a tiny proportion of Americans are rapists, a tiny proportion of Americans are fraudsters. Maybe we should deport everyone and start over. You know, to be safe.

People draw parallels to blocking Iranians from entering the US during the war with Iran. It's one thing to be at war with a specific nation but that's not the case. To say we are at war with Islam is absurd because "Islam" describes an ideology with comes in many varieties. Millions of Muslims around the world go about their day-to-day lives without blowing people up, cutting peoples' heads off or causing any trouble at all. Of course the Muslim who invites their neighbor in out of the cold (1) when their front door jammed shut doesn't make the international news. The Muslim who goes to work, says their prayers quietly in the relative privacy of a closed room and then goes home (2) doesn't make the international news. The Muslim who owns and runs a small hardware store and helps anyone who enters (3) doesn't make the international news. So why do we bend to the wishes of the media who want to keep us scared?

(1) - This Muslim was my neighbor and invited me in when I couldn't get into my own house
(2) - This Muslim was a guy I worked with for nearly two years
(3) - This Muslim owned my local hardware store that I visited many times over the course of 15 years.

Brighten04 said:

I heard about the Japanese interment camps during WWII. I do not want to see citizens of our country treated like that.And please remember the Jews in Nazi Germany. We have a lot of Muslim Americans. And though I am conflicted about whether to trust them,I believe in our Declaration of Independence. And unless, as Americans, no longer believe or hold these truths that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. That among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, we should really examin e ourselves stringently. As a Christian, I would not like to be persecuted for my beliefs. The Word of God tells us to do unto others as we would have others do unto us.Our country let other religious beliefs thrive here. We did not close off admittance to any people group. Now we are in a pickle. I don't see an answer. And the Donald's answer seems wrong somehow, even though to an extent I agree in part with it. But the incidents I mentioned regarding the Japanese and the Jews give me pause.

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Certainly on this issue I believe the simple truth is that Donald Trump is a fool. He appears to be doing little more than rabble rousing, proposing solutions that are totally unworkable and yet, if implemented, would turn government into the worst nightmare we could imagine.

If the freedoms granted to all Americans are suspended for one group such that Muslims can be rounded up and incarcerated for an unspecified period, how long do we think it will be before a few nutjobs calling themselves Christians cause the government to do the same to us? We might be clamoring for Nanny State to Do Something To Protect Us but what happens when some other group decides that they want protection from Christians?

The treatment of Jews in Nazi Germany should be all it takes to blow this bizarre obsession with Muslims out of the water. Sadly when so many people have never met a real Muslim and have no exposure to them other than the media images of men in black bandanas wielding Kalashnikovs it's easy to see why Muslims are regarded as some kind of weird group of people who are Not At All Like Us. And it's easy to demonise people who are Not Like Us, especially when there's little to no chance to meet some Real Muslim People and realise they aren't so different to the rest of us after all.

Ruth said:

You mentioned vetting before Bill. What exactly is vetting? I know it already takes some people 2 years to enter this country because of background checks. I am glad they are being thorough about it.

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Vetting for immigration purposes can take a long time, and I imagine a non-immigrant visa also takes time even if less time.

I see what you mean. There definitely is a problem with terrorism and we have to do something to try and stop it.

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Terrorism is a problem vastly smaller than we might be led to believe. Look at how many Americans have died due to terrorism in the last 15 years, against how many Americans have died due to road traffic accidents. Where's the War On Vehicles? We get in our cars every day even knowing that north of 10,000 people die every year in road traffic accidents. Yet a couple of dozen people are killed by a nutjob with a gun and everybody panics. What's wrong with this picture?

We are not putting anyone in camps just telling them they have to be scrutinized before they enter this country. I am glad it is not easy for anyone to enter this country now a days.

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It is easy to enter the country if you are a citizen of a nation that is allowed to use the Visa Waiver Program. And if you're a fugitive with cash to burn, you can fly to Mexico and pay a coyote to get you across the border into Texas.