Day: March 26, 2009

US “eases the burden” of Malta’s illegal immigration problem

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Geez!  Here we are with cable news reporting tonight that we could have tens of thousands of Mexican “refugees” streaming across our border as the drug wars escalate to our immediate south, and we are busy easing the burden of an illegal immigration flood to a tiny island in the Mediterranean.  We sure are a nice country.

From Malta Today:

A group of 35 from Sudan, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea left Malta yesterday to commence a new life in the United States.

This latest departure brings the total number of refugees resettled in the US since May 2008 to 223.

The programme is a collaborative partnership among the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the International Office of Migration (IOM), the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and a number of local non-governmental organisations.

So far the UNHCR has referred asylum seekers to the resettlement program who were given temporary humanitarian protection. UNHCR is continuing the screening process, and has so far referred more than 300 cases that are now in the process of being resettled to the US.

Jason Davis, Chargé d’Affaires at the U.S. Embassy said the continuation of the refugee resettlement programme showed America’s continuing commitment to help ease the burden that migration has placed on Malta, enabling Malta to cope more effectively with those that remain, and that it demonstrates our recognition of the enormous challenges and dangers that many of the migrants have faced.

Hey, maybe Malta will help us out and take some of our Mexicans.  That’s an idea!  We could have an illegal alien swap.

Comment worth noting: Why do we “resent” Iraqi refugees?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Here is a comment from reader Liz posted at our fact sheets link above.

I volunteer for the List Project, which resettles Iraqi refugees who worked for the U.S. government in Iraq as translators, doctors, engineers, to name a few. As a result of their association with Americans, they are hunted, killed, and have their houses burned down.

Why would you not want to help resettle and fund these Iraqis? They suffered terribly while working for OUR GOVERNMENT in a war we started. They come here as very highly educated people who simply want peace and a safe place to live. They are muslim and christian.

Please explain why you resent them?

Thank you

Dear Liz,  we have written 341 posts on Iraqi refugees and if you read even a small fraction of those, I doubt you could make the statement:  “Please explain why you resent them?”   (Note, Liz places a question mark here but she isn’t really questioning, she is stating what she believes is fact.)   I contend that we have a greater concern for the well-being of the Iraqis than Liz does.

This is how leftists operate—they attempt to shut down a serious public policy discussion by vilifying anyone who disagrees with them.  

“[R]esent them?”   How on earth do you get that we “resent them?”   Bringing Iraqi refugees to the US in large numbers at this time of economic turmoil, not encouraging them to return to Iraq to help rebuild it,  placing older Iraqi professionals in jobs cleaning motels,  having Iraqis come here then fear eviction and complaining about the resettlement agencies neglecting them, aren’t these issues that warrant serious public debate and discussion?   Instead you, Liz,  and many others like you, emotionally driven,  just wish to shut down a serious discussion by attempting to silence any critics.  It won’t work (we are hard-hearted afterall!)

Sincerely,  Ann

P.S.  It just occurred to me that maybe you don’t know about all the unhappy Iraqis in the US, because I bet your leaders at the List Project aren’t telling you (if they even know).   Check out our Iraqi refugee category where we have reported from 17 states where recently resettled Iraqis are unhappy and wishing to go home to the Middle East.

Another refugee who went home

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

We are told it is “rare” for refugees to go back to their homeland, it may well be, but I think there are more than we are told about.   It would undermine the refugee resettlement program if too many of these cases were made public.

Buried in a puff piece on refugees in North Carolina is this little bit of information about a homeless African refugee.

It can take up to five years to assimilate, Ognodo (director of the Neighborhood Good Samaritan Center)  says, but some never do. In December, Ognodo said he found one former student homeless and involved in drugs. The teen’s father had died. The youth had stopped visiting the Samaritan Center. Ognodo helped send him back to family in Africa.

Reform needed:   If a refugee wishes to return home, his or her airfare should be paid by the volag (government contractor) whose job it was to resettle the refugee in the first place.  The volag should also use its own funds and not taxpayer money for the plane ticket!   It would be a way of identifying which volags were not doing a good job of caring for and assimilating refugees.

Obama “heartbroken” over homeless…..

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

…..then why are we bringing more people here to make them homeless? 

Here is an AP report on something Obama said Tuesday evening at that boring press conference.

WASHINGTON (AP) – At a time when millions of Americans are losing their jobs and their homes, President Barack Obama says he’s “heartbroken” that any children are without a roof over their heads.

Obama says the “most important thing” that he can do for those children is make sure that their parents have jobs. And he again pointed to his plan to save or create 3.5 million jobs through his economic stimulus package.

[….]

And the president told reporters at a Tuesday evening news conference that there needs to be a “change in attitude” in the country, so that it isn’t seen as “acceptable” for children and families to be homeless.

Honest to goodness, would someone please tell me then why we are bringing more immigrants and refugees to the US  and making them homeless?   Only two days ago we told you about an Iraqi family that became homeless and decided to return to Syria.   Then there was a discussion in Boise, ID of possible tent cities for homeless refugees.  Or, how about the refugee in Dallas worried that he would soon be living under the bridge.

I’ll answer my own question, I think there are political powers in this country that want people to be homeless and living in poverty because those poor people continue to fuel the Alinsky battle of the ‘have nots’ vs. the ‘haves.’   If people are content they do not demand change (see our category on Community Destabilization here on how that works).  The change Obama is after is to make more people dependent on government and thus bring about socialism.    And, since we were running out of our own poor and angry people, we import them.

By the way, check out this American Thinker article that Judy sent to me yesterday entitled, “What kind of President thrives on chaos?”

I don’t believe Obama is at all “heartbroken.”