Disagree. We fucked up Iraq which led to subsequent instability We have a responsibility to, at least, Iraqi refugees if not to more. We have the space, we have organizations willing to undertake it. We have the moral obligation.
I am dealing with today not yesterday and seeking safety rather than inviting risk.
Just like they did yesterday. Some things never change unfortunately. That's the politics of fear.
Not fear, but caution.
When you look at the refugee process - it's two years of vetting and checking.
We have settled 784,000 refugees since 9/11. Since then, exactly three have been arrested in relation to terrorist activities. Of those 3 - 2 were not planning an attack in the US and "
the plans of the third were barely credible"
We are not like the European continent and are isolated from the direct influx of refugees by an ocean.
The most common arguments against resettling more Syrian refugees, made by some Republican presidential candidates and members of Congress, is that the resettlement program could be a path for infiltration into the United States by ISIS or other terrorists. But the refugee resettlement program is the least likely avenue for a terrorist to choose. Refugees who are selected for resettlement to the United States go through a painstaking, many-layered review before they are accepted. The FBI, Department of Homeland Security, State Department, and national intelligence agencies independently check refugees’ biometric data against security databases. The whole process typically takes 18-24 months, with high hurdles for security clearance.
The United States is protected by geography from the inflow of asylum seekers who are entering Europe, mainly through Greece and Italy. Almost 600,000 have arrived in Europe so far this year—as many as 1 million may have entered by year’s end. The majority are unquestionably refugees. Germany and other European states have not invited them or agreed in advance to accept them—the refugees have just arrived, after dangerous journeys across the sea and overland. But European states are bound by their international obligations not to return them to danger. The United States, by contrast, has the luxury of choice of which refugees to admit through its resettlement program, from Syria, Iraq, or elsewhere. How robustly will it exercise that choice?
Rational "caution" would tell us this is not where we need to concentrate our efforts, rather we should look at other avenues of entry that are a higher risk for ISIS infiltration than the refugee process.
So yes, the politics of fear.
