If you are reading this, you are likely a person of intellectual curiosity that is willing to investigate a different point of view and perhaps question the mainstream media. The following is an attempt to clarify some of the misinformation regarding the perceived humanitarian meltdown of the United States.
THE MUSLIM BAN OR CAREFUL VETTING?
The executive order has been misrepresented and unfairly vilified. The ban is not a religious ban, but a vetting system that targets the countries that the previous administration deemed as the most up to date list of nations that foment and harbor terrorists.
Homeland Security Secretary John F. Kelly said: “This is not a travel ban. This is a temporary pause that allows us to better review the existing refugee & visa vetting system”.
According to an ABC News article from 2013, the Obama administration also ceased the process of Iraqi refugees from entering the U.S. in 2011 for a six-month period, even for people who had previously helped U.S. forces in Iraq. One person who applied for refugee status was even killed while waiting to be processed. This order happened after 2 Iraqi refugees in Kentucky were found to be al Qaeda terrorists and had killed U.S. soldiers while in Iraq. According to the report: “Several dozen suspected terrorist bombmakers, including some believed to have targeted American troops, may have mistakenly been allowed to move to the United States as war refugees.”
If you are an American or a legal resident coming from these countries, you will be released right away – after careful vetting. If you are not, then the new process will be longer and stricter than before in order to keep our citizens safe from dangerous acts of terrorism as we’ve been seeing in Europe, The Middle East, Africa, and even our own land. The vetting system used by the previous administration was found to be inappropriate according to their own intelligence experts – including the FBI. We can not allow dangerous people to enter our country to commit terrible crimes. This momentary pause is necessary.
FREE TRADE VS FAIR TRADE
Trade agreements such as NAFTA or TPP will only be renewed if they are fair. Even Bernie Sanders has gone recently on record criticizing such trade agreements as unfair to our country and our workers, while benefiting big corporations and other countries’ economies.
Claims by the US Chamber of Commerce that NAFTA has created millions of jobs are based on disingenuous accounting, which counts only jobs gained by exports but ignores jobs lost due to growing imports. The U.S. economy has grown in the past 20 years despite NAFTA, not because of it. Worse yet, wages in the United States have suffered. Likewise, workers in Mexico haven’t seen wage growth. Job losses and wage stagnation are NAFTA’s real legacy.
Companies from U.S. and Canada moved to Mexico because of cheap labor and lower corporate taxes. Americans factories closed, and American workers became unemployed; as for Mexico, no improvement for the average citizens, workers are under payed and their economy is still underperforming.
Trump is not a protectionist, he’s a believer of “free-fair trade”. NAFTA allows Mexico to pollute the environment, has poor labor laws (including abuse of women and children), manipulates its currency, and does not create opportunity for average blue collar workers.
Conservative and Free Market principles cannot work without justice and fairness for all players. The Trump administration is determined to even out the playing field.
THE WALL IS ANTI-IMMIGRATION OR IS IT ANTI-CRIME?
President Trump has mentioned several times that the main focus of his immigration policies is to deport illegal criminals, while welcoming those who are a positive contribution to our society.
Our country has been taken advantage by the unwillingness of prior administrations to enforce our immigration laws. Border control is a matter of safety and sovereignty, race has no place in the conversation. Mexico has one of the strongest immigration laws in the world, and they are not considered racist or inhumane for enforcing them – it is their sovereign right.
We have a poverty, unemployment, and lack of social mobility problem that needs to be addressed immediately – ahead of helping those who cross our borders illegally. Additionally, the border has been a friendly enabler of drug, arms and human trafficking due to past administrations’ negligence and unwillingness to fight a corrupt and unethical system.
Consider that President Donald Trump’s victory was an unforeseeable blow to the establishment, and their “fake news” propaganda machine. An aggressive and Machiavellian opposition attack to regain control of the system and the “status quo” is expected. It is our responsibility to expose the truth behind the strategies of indoctrination that are being used, with clear and respectful dialogue that can win the hearts and minds of people with good intentions but with equivocated information.
Pedro Monge was a graduate of the prestigious Colegio San Gabriel in Quito, Ecuador and of Rutgers University in New Jersey where he earned a master’s degree in political science in 2010. He was Republican candidate for NY Assemblyman in 2008. Political contributor to The Heritage Foundation in 2013. He manages his own blog of political analysis since 2008; he owns and manages the page www.TrumpPresidente.com; as well as Facebook pages: democracy and freedom, and Trump President. Its focus is on political analysis of Latin America and the United States. He encourages the conservative thinking of the free will, and of the peace through freedom. Pedro is Director of Bear Witness Center in the New Jersey and New York areas.
