What is the difference....

I use the term colored folks or colored people or gentleman of color all the time. Many of us here do.
None have voiced any disagreement to the term.
It simply was the way we were brought up. It's acceptable in the South

 

Sorry @PaxMentis but I don't know what to call them. I am serious. That label changes all the time and no one send this white girl the memo.

 

I guess I am, at least over the past 13 years, just western and out of touch with the rest. If asked someone's race and they are what I assume is meant by "colored", I say black (which was the term on the government forms I filed for many years). I don't generally differentiate unless someone asks me for some reason. For me there is what I call the criminal class, which is made up of pretty much all races...and there are predominantly black, hispanic, chinese, italian, etc neighborhoods...some of which tend to have a higher percentage in that class. Maybe I am out of touch in my little valey in Oregon and colored has become common usage again, but I honestly didn't find it in common usage when I still visited pretty much every region of the country before I retired. Is "colored" specifically black, or does it include hispanic, chinese, and other groups with other than pink skin? I think I may be just unfamiliar with the term due to becoming so provincial...I have literally never heard it in Oregon (and there is no reason it would have arisen on my trip except maybe my grand-niece's boyfriend who joined us for Thanksgiving and is what I call black...but that is in AZ...also the west)

 

I agree with this^^^^^ the Feds have mucked it all up. Actually they are incompetent in truly vetting immigrants, Political candidates....

The problem is that we cannot just open the doors. We have to make it semi-difficult to come here otherwise we would be flooded with people. It reminds me of the gumball video that is floating around. Help them where they are.

That is the issue. We allow politicians to deem what actions are considered potentially criminal. We have a system where the best campaigner gets to decide how society should be run. I am not so sure we still live in a free society.

 

We generally just ask, Where you from and what's your family's name?, That in itself tells me plenty without asking a person's race.
I've never been to Oregon, But I hear it's nice country!

 

Well...I am pretty sure we don't live in what was called a free country in my youth. I'm not even sure one could say the best campaigner wins any more...I would say the best machine if I was even really confident the elections themselves meant anything. I don't think those who really choose would allow a candidate that represented a real chance at freedom to even make the final cut.

But to the main point of your response...why do we even allow anyone to take actions based on potentially criminal? When it comes down to survival and fighting to protect our citizens, I don't think "criminal" is the word.

As Uncle Morgan said above, with regard to protecting our citizens, the idea of admitting members of a group (religious or otherwise) that is sworn to our assimilation into their system or our death is akin to national suicide. Call it whatever you like, but protection of our citizens from outsiders who would destroy what is left of our society is neither a game nor an exercise in political correctness...it is war.

 

Nobody said not to vet them...they all need to be vetted. The problem is this decidedly unconstitutional notion of banning people based upon their religion. By doing so the government is essentially prohibiting the free exercise of religion by those wishing to enter this country. Congress got it right yesterday when they took the baby step of limiting the visa waiver program. What they should do is put the entire visa waiver program on hold...if you want to come here, get a freakin visa. If Trump wants to put a temporary ban on ALL immigration, I'm cool with that, but I will not support a ban on only people based on their religious beliefs because it is against everything this country stands for and against the Constitution that both you and I took and oath to defend.

I don't want to get your blood pressure up, we're on the same team...but we can't let our personal prejudices take precedence over our duty and our oath. Personally, I hate haji...I'd love nothing more that to run them all out of the country on a rail...but my duty and my oath come before my personal issues with them.

 

And I will continue to disagree. We have no obligation to either extend the constitutional protections to people everywhere or defend even the basic rights of people outside our borders. Admitting those who belong to a group, religious or otherwise, sworn to destroy our way of life is foolishness and not required by any portion of the constitution.

Once we legally admit them, yes, we are obligated to observe and protect those rights until they are proven to commit acts of war...but not before.

 

That's the Declaration of Independence...

 

I'm sorry, but the Constitution disagrees with you. The Constitution distinguishes between "citizens" and "all persons". The Constitution applies to all people we deal with under our law, not just citizens. Once they apply for entry to our country or are in our country, they fall under our law...just like we fall under the laws of other countries when we apply for entry or have entered their countries.

I don't understand why it is so important to some to discriminate on the basis of religion, which is clearly Constitutionally protected...and a lot harder to do from a practical and logistical standpoint, rather than to just continue to apply the law as we have, based on nationality and other non-protected criteria...or simply applying the law or ban to everyone equally?

 

Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Amendment XIV
Section 1.
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Why would we have to define which "persons" are "citizens" if the Constitution considered "persons", "people" and "citizens" to be one in the same?

 

The constitution was not meant to serve the world, it is basically the "charter" between the government and the people of the United States of America and has no bearing on our dealings with people outside our borders.

You can choose in your mind to extend it's guarantees to the peoples of the world, but the constitution does not do so...and, by doing so we would commit national suicide. The courts over the past century have extended the list of guaranteed "rights" to the ridiculous extreme...to further extend the protection of those rights to everyone in the world regardless of how that affects our national interest would be the final nail in the coffin.

Admitting people to the country and placing them under that protection, in spite of the fact they belong to a group that is sworn to destroy our way of life is ludicrous. Would you really have admitted members of the Nazi Party to the US in 1942? Would you have admitted card carrying communists in the 50's?

 

I would like to clarify something here. I have absolutely no use for Donald Trump...I think his proposals on dealing with Muslims already lawfully in the country are terrible...and counter to constitutional protections that are a basis of our nation.

However, the question in this thread is about admitting Muslims not currently in this country. I do not believe those people are protected by our constitution and that we can and should do what is best for our society...and (IMO) that means at the very least a moratorium on admitting them.

 

I am reminded of how Japanese Americans were treated after Pearl Harbor.

 

I didn't make a judgement, I stated a fact.
I'm not happy with any part of what's going on, with these "refugees".
I would be in favor with closed borders to ALL imagrants and an end to all foreign aid. (We have enough stuff here that needs fixin'.) Let 'em take care of their own problems, for once.
What I observe, is we are headed down the same path, in how we respond to foreigners (or those we think of as foreigners). You remember " the only good jap is a dead, is a dead jap!"? How is that any different than "the only good Muslim is a dead Muslim! "? Even Popeye the Sailorman got in on the rhetoric.

"In criminal law, Blackstone's formulation (also known as Blackstone's ratio or the Blackstone ratio) is the principle that:

"It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer",

...as expressed by the English jurist William Blackstone in his seminal work, Commentaries on the Laws of England, published in the 1760s.

Historically, the details of the ratio have varied, but the message that government and the courts must err on the side of innocence has remained constant."

And yet, that is not what we do as a people, is it? We condemn gun owners for shooters, painters for graffiti taggers, outdoorsman for gas guzzlers, businessmen for profiteers, bankers for loan sharks, Preppers for hoarders, and men as unfit as single parents unless the mother is dead. We assume the worst in folks, and to hell with " innocent until proven guilty in a court of law".

We have a working immigration system. It's not broken, it's overloaded. I have family members from Iran, Germany, France, Italy. They all came through the system as designed. It does work. And those who go through the process get pissed off at the groups being shoved through now, as if they had a right to jump the line. The arrive here knowing nothing useful about this country besides the freebees, and their new Rights. (But they are not taught much about them, or the responsibilities that go with them). Last I heard, their packet of info talks about the 1st and the 5th, and that's about it.
The immigration process is not the problem. The UNEQUAL enforcement of its rules IS.

 

Actually G...the fact that it wasn't in the constitution and used in response to this:
(emphasis added)

Made it unneeded to point out that it is also not relevant to the question at hand. Equality at birth is not really the question here...whether or not we should (and, according to some, must) admit people to the USA who are not citizens and are members of a group sworn to destroy us. If we apply the phrase "all men are created equal" in the way you seem to intimate, then we must admit anyone who shows up at the door...regardless of any outside factors.

The document in which that phrase occurs, I believe is relevant. It is not in the charter that outlines the rights and responsibilities of the government with regard to the people of the United States, but rather in a document listing our reasons for breaking apart from another government that ruled us. It is a document of self-actualization, a document saying that since we were not being treated as equals, we would go our own way....not a justification to be allowed into a society our prophet tells us must be subjugated.