Month: February 2009

The speech Geert Wilders would have given

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

This is not directly about refugees, but I thought it was important enough to post anyway. Free speech is an issue all over the world, and those of us who have blogs or who write or speak for public consumption in other ways have an intense interest in keeping our speech free here in the United States. Britain no longer has free speech, and the banning of Dutch member of Parliament Geert Wilders is one result. Wilders was thought to be too inflammatory for tender British ears in that he criticizes Islam. For the last four years he has been under 24-hour-a-day guard in the Netherlands as the result of death threats.

Thanks to Diana West for posting Wilders’s speech on her blog. It is very moving, and it is a shameful thing that Wilders was prevented from entering Britain to give it. Here’s a short excerpt:

In 1982 President Reagan came to the House of Commons, where he did a speech very few people liked. Reagan called upon the West to reject communism and defend freedom. He introduced a phrase: ‘evil empire’. Reagan’s speech stands out as a clarion call to preserve our liberties. I quote: If history teaches anything, it teaches self-delusion in the face of unpleasant facts is folly.

What Reagan meant is that you cannot run away from history, you cannot escape the dangers of ideologies that are out to destroy you. Denial is no option.

Communism was indeed left on the ash heap of history, just as Reagan predicted in his speech in the House of Commons. He lived to see the Berlin Wall coming down, just as Churchill witnessed the implosion of national-socialism.

Today, I come before you to warn of another great threat. It is called Islam. It poses as a religion, but its goals are very worldly: world domination, holy war, sharia law, the end of the separation of church and state, the end of democracy. It is not a religion, it is a political ideology. It demands you respect, but has no respect for you.

Read more about the current Wilders incident at FrontPage Magazine, here. And see our previous posts mentioning Wilders here.

Part I: Refugee Council USA has recommendations for Obama and Congress

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

The Refugee Council USA is a consortium of groups involved in the refugee industry.   Recently I came across their briefing book for the new Administration and the 111th Congress.  You will find it here.

There are many recommendations and so I’ll write about this in a couple of posts.    Since we have been discussing the Emergency Refugee and Migration Assistance (ERMA) funds recently, I’ll start there.  First go back and read Judy’s post of two days ago in which she clarifies a misunderstanding that had developed in the blogosphere about ERMA funds going to Gaza.    The  US taxpayer-funded ERMA account is used for “humanitarian assistance” elsewhere in the world and is not for the purpose of resettling refugees in the US.

Here is what the Refugee Council USA says about ERMA.  Not surprisingly they want more money, but they also want the President out of the loop.

ERMA provides the Bureau of Population Refugees and Migration (PRM) of the Department of State with an emergency pool of $100 million that it can draw on in the event of an unexpected crisis.  Currently, draw downs must be approved by the President.  This requirement can considerably slow down the process.  Moreover, the $100 million ceiling on the account has not been updated in over a decade, even though costs and demands on the account have risen significantly.  The ERMA ceiling should be raised to $200 million and the Secretary of State should be given the authority to approve ERMA draw downs.

Previously unhappy Iraqi refugee gets a job…

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

…. but Mom is going home to Iraq.

We first told you about Firas Taresh, an Iraqi man, who had been resettled on Long Island with his younger brother and mother back in September.   His story about joblessness was among the first we posted on unemployed Iraqis.   This is an update.   He has a job.  From the East Hampton Star:

Next week, the 33-year-old Iraqi refugee, who settled on the South Fork with his family in August, will begin working at Symbion Power, an engineering company in Washington, D.C. Symbion focuses on the transmission and distribution of electricity in the Middle East. Mr. Taresh will be in an administrative job, and sees an opportunity to contribute to the company’s foreign projects, many of which are based in Iraq.

Even before the war he had wanted to come to America.

“I dreamed of coming to the United States all my life, but never as a refugee,” he said. “I thought maybe as an immigrant, as a skilled worker or a student with a scholarship, but as a refugee? I never imagined something like this.”

Catholic Charities wasn’t much help.

Mr. Taresh also never imagined how difficult it would be to find a job. He said he applied to Bechtel more than 50 times, and each time was turned down. Meetings with representatives of Catholic Charities, a local partner of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, did not yield the results he was given to expect, such as cash assistance and food stamps. His younger brother is the only member of the family who has gotten health insurance. “There is no explanation,” he said. “I never imagined I was going to face the difficulties I am facing in this country.”

We continue to be puzzled why many of these Iraqi refugees say they “were given to expect” better living conditions in the US.  Who misled them?

His brother and sister, still in Iraq, say things are improving and so Mom is going home.

His mother, he said, has had a much more difficult time adjusting, and hopes to go home. “Insha’Allah,” she said, or “God willing.” A few weeks ago, Mr. Taresh took his mother to Washington to get her passport renewed.

Children’s Health Insurance law includes funds for legal immigrant children

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

We missed this story last week.   Hat tip to Joyce today for tipping me off.

President Barack Obama’s administration has brought to Washington a new attitude toward the issue of immigration, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said Thursday.

In comments to a small group of Hispanic journalists, Emanuel cited Wednesday’s ceremony where Obama signed into law a bill reauthorizing the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.

The chief of staff pointed out that the law increases the number of youngsters covered by SCHIP, as the program is known, from 7 million to 11 million, including – for the first time – children of legal immigrants.

More immigrant goodies on the way?

The expansion of SCHIP to immigrants’ children represents “an advance” on what the Obama administration plans to do on behalf of immigrants during the next four years, Emanuel said.

Burmese official: Rohingya “ugly as ogres”

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Oh boy,  this will be really helpful in the debate on how to deal with the Rohingya Muslims flowing out of Myanamar (Burma).   Guess these guys didn’t get the political correctness memo!    From AFP:

HONG KONG (AFP) — Myanmar’s senior official in Hong Kong has described the Rohingya people as “ugly as ogres” in a letter sent to media and foreign officials after a high-profile refugee case highlighted their plight.

The country’s Consul General Ye Myint Aung told heads of foreign missions in Hong Kong and local newspapers members of the Muslim ethnic group should not be described as being from Myanmar.

“In reality, Rohingya are neither Myanmar people nor Myanmar’s ethnic group,” he wrote, in a letter seen by AFP on Wednesday.

The envoy contrasted the “dark brown” Rohingya complexion with the “fair and soft” skin of people from Myanmar, which he said was “good looking as well”.

The leaders of the Burmese government maintain that the Rohingya are not an ethnic minority in Burma but are illegal aliens from Bangladesh. 

New readers should know that this controversy that seems so far away may affect us at some point because pressure is mounting for the Rohingya to be resettled in the West.   See our category ‘Rohingya Reports’ to catch up on the story.