They're serious...
What the fuck do they have to gain? How many immigrants have been true terrorists in the past 5 years? (And no one link me to a Trump site)

For your reading pleasure from the fairly independent and neutral New America group who keep public available tabs on terror threat data.

• Terrorism in America - Part I
• Terrorism in America - Part II
• Terrorism in America - Part IV

Relevant as well, but a few from news sources.

• Townhall - "800 Immigrants From Countries Of National Security Concern Granted Citizenship"
• Fox News - "Immigrants from Terror Hubs Claiming 'Credible Fear' to Seek US Asylum"
• USA Today - "Accused Ohio State Attacker Reportedly Posted Rant Online"

I should also add that if you do not believe you are already being monitored as a potential person of interest and that this somehow seized your attention, you are woefully behind in the game. Your average employer is already starting to monitor your social media activity for conduct unbecoming of your occupation; the government has and does this one better, depending upon how important to them you are.

They're serious...
What the fuck do they have to gain? How many immigrants have been true terrorists in the past 5 years? (And no one link me to a Trump site)

Perhaps they're scared of facing the same threat Europe is facing right now. Something that happens in Europe can happen in the USA. Not that I deem it likely, but then again if they're scared of it, they feel fear, and fear isn't really rational most of the time.

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Perhaps they're scared of facing the same threat Europe is facing right now. Something that happens in Europe can happen in the USA. Not that I deem it likely, but then again if they're scared of it, they feel fear, and fear isn't really rational most of the time.

Caution =/= fear

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Caution =/= fear

.. nowhere did I imply that it was, but yeah, you're right.

Doesn't mean caution is warranted. The threat in America is about as real as Godzilla when it comes to immigrants, compared to Europe.

Doesn't mean caution is warranted. The threat in America is about as real as Godzilla when it comes to immigrants, compared to Europe.

Not so fast... Also, ISIS has second-generation and the like.

I could keep going but you get the point. This isn't a fictional threat.

Now it's true -- Europe's situation is worse. Europe is closer, Europe is taking more refugees in. Europe is getting hit more -- except of course for Poland, which takes in zero refugees and has suffered zero attacks. A stats analyst could probably find a pattern there, but that's beside the point. If we know Islamist terrorism is a threat, and we know that Europe -- taking more refugees from areas with Islamist movements -- suffers a greater number of attacks... Doesn't that justify restrictions on refugee intake from those same areas? Our national interest would seem to dictate precisely that course of action.

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Not so fast... Also, ISIS has second-generation and the like.

I could keep going but you get the point. This isn't a fictional threat.

Now it's true -- Europe's situation is worse. Europe is closer, Europe is taking more refugees in. Europe is getting hit more -- except of course for Poland, which takes in zero refugees and has suffered zero attacks. A stats analyst could probably find a pattern there, but that's beside the point. If we know Islamist terrorism is a threat, and we know that Europe -- taking more refugees from areas with Islamist movements -- suffers a greater number of attacks... Doesn't that justify restrictions on refugee intake from those same areas? Our national interest would seem to dictate precisely that course of action.

Ah, I was under the impression that this referred to Islamic immigrants from areas like Iran, which is what most of the attention has been shifted to given recent changes.

It seems that this is more shifted towards immigrants in general. Which could be better or worse. Sounds like you're dragging a net through the ocean that doesn't have many fish to begin with. But, we'll see. If it's immigrants in general then it makes a bit more sense, but still seems like this isn't the right step forwards.

As for Poland - not true. Poland took in refugees - it's just that the moment the refugees arrived, the very next day they'd already escaped and went to Germany instead.

That said, the Netherlands hasn't suffered an attack yet either and we do have refugees. So, there seems to be little causation there in terms of your actual argument. Does it contribute? Yes, 100%, taking in refugees from those areas is a risk. But it's not a guarantee.

Waiting until we have a problem and then acting is foolish. It is easier to stop a problem from developing in the first place than it is to untangle it after it has already developed. To look at the situation in Europe and then say that maybe migrants aren't a problem is obtuse. The cost of migrants outweighs the benefits.

Sounds like you're dragging a net through the ocean that doesn't have many fish to begin with. But, we'll see.

I don't quite get your meaning.

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I don't quite get your meaning.

How many immigrants come to the USA yearly? That's a lot of fish to sieve through and that is just to establish 'potential' POI's. Then you drag a smaller finer net through that batch to get the people who actually are suspicious. Mind you, by that time you're left with, what, maybe 1% of all immigrants. Seems like you're looking for a needle in a haystack and using the most inefficient way to do it.

What I'm saying is, from the article I infer that they're using big data on a pool that is incredibly large. But they're using it in a way that isn't effective. Eh, we have this thing called 'dragging nets' or sleepnet. It's a net you drag through the ocean at the bottom and catch fish with it that way. It's nice because you catch a lot of fish with relatively little effort. But it's bad because the net gets tangled and you catch things you don't need - it's not very specific.

It's the same with surveillance. If you use a net like that (net referring to the method of detection) you're gonna get stuck a lot and you're gonna catch a lot of things that are not what you need (like, you're looking for herring but you catch a lot of trout or w/e. In surveillance, you want to catch the bad guys, but you're gonna just end up catching a lot of guys who google 'egg timer' and 'camping propane tank' or people who just happen to write something weird).

I'm not saying the entire idea of this is erroneous because it could be used, but they haven't refined it and taken extra processing steps to the point where they can minimize the amount of false reports. They're just analyzing big data and not knowing what they're looking for. It's a problem that has existed in US intelligence agencies since.. forever. That's why there's so many reports of people being watched for no reason or getting swatted for weird reasons.

Waiting until we have a problem and then acting is foolish. It is easier to stop a problem from developing in the first place than it is to untangle it after it has already developed. To look at the situation in Europe and then say that maybe migrants aren't a problem is obtuse. The cost of migrants outweighs the benefits.

The situation here is more just one of intense stupidity and the EU's idiotic structures. I mean, pairing up all the different things that go into this, it's just stupid and we never should've gotten into it. Letting the EU decides who takes how many refugees? Retarded. Letting the EU dictate the vetting process? Retarded. Letting Turkey hold us hostage with refugees? Retarded. Putting thousands of refugees in countries that already have failing infrastructure for housing? RETARDED. Putting refugees in countries with plenty of population while not giving more to the countries that need population? Makes me screech like a retarded kid on /pol/ that thinks the jews are behind everything. It really makes me mad.

Maybe this is my god complex talking but I think if I was in charge I could've done something far more efficient than the shit we have now. It's just plain bad and stupid. Now with the recent German elections we might get Merkel to tone it down a bit before she loses even more votes.

snip

Gotcha.

Yeah, it's inefficient. Still... I mean let's stick with ocean analogies. There are not a whole lot of shark attacks in a given year -- but we still try to protect ocean-goers from sharks. If the lifeguard blows that shark-whistle (do they have shark whistles? Shark alarms? Shark cowbells, I bet it's cowbells). If the lifeguard rings that shark-cowbell, you get your butt out of the damn water.

I think the government has to be a little paranoid -- it's their job. NSA phone monitoring is a LOT paranoid, and it's probably a violation of civil liberties, and I'd like it to stop. Browsing facebook is a happier medium, and like I said I'm still not crazy about it -- but I understand why it's happening, and they're not literally insane for thinking it up.

Why let in just a bit of a problem when you can let in none of it at all?

Why let in just a bit of a problem when you can let in none of it at all?

If you vet potential immigrants properly, you minimize the risk of admitting future murderers -- and then you get to add some real brains and goodness to your list of national resources. Good immigration is an asset. Uncontrolled immigration, poorly vetted immigration, illegal immigration -- these are what cause problems. Just ask Francistan.

Approximately ten hours ago at this time of posting, this remarkable video was released to further expose the threat of politically motivated domestic terrorism to the United States. There's more to come, believe me. This is not the first publicly available release I have seen or heard that included the detail that supposed "anti-fascists" are actively arming themselves with the intent to commit serious offenses against persons. This is also ignoring their efforts to organize and their methods of decentralized leadership, even including somewhat encrypted or closed circle communication, aimed against the public and state. There's also another emerging fiasco to further emphasize the extreme levels this is getting to; you can additionally thank this would-be for bringing added attention to it by making himself internet famous.

There is also another gem that proves the lows they will stoop to, those of which know no bounds. They are willing to surpass beyond being cruel to other people and far into the maiming, torturing, and killing of animals.

I'd grab my tinfoil hat but silver is so not my color.

Why let in just a bit of a problem when you can let in none of it at all?

Countries like Sweden have a collapsing social system that is dying under the weight of a greying populace. Germany has a similar problem. If they don't let in these immigrants (because that's what they are even if they act like refugees) their country will need to adapt to a greying population and change their social system and that'd be pretty bad because of path dependency.

There's a good reason to let them in, it's just a shame that they're forcing the others that don't have that reason to do the same. For example the Netherlands has no need for immigrants because we already have too many people and too few houses as it is.

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Gotcha.

Yeah, it's inefficient. Still... I mean let's stick with ocean analogies. There are not a whole lot of shark attacks in a given year -- but we still try to protect ocean-goers from sharks. If the lifeguard blows that shark-whistle (do they have shark whistles? Shark alarms? Shark cowbells, I bet it's cowbells). If the lifeguard rings that shark-cowbell, you get your butt out of the damn water.

I think the government has to be a little paranoid -- it's their job. NSA phone monitoring is a LOT paranoid, and it's probably a violation of civil liberties, and I'd like it to stop. Browsing facebook is a happier medium, and like I said I'm still not crazy about it -- but I understand why it's happening, and they're not literally insane for thinking it up.

Sorry for the late reply, it kinda slipped my mind.

Yeah, you're right, there's not a whole lot of shark attacks in a year but if you get attacked, you obviously think 'man this sucks.' I'm not denying that, it's absolutely true and we should do what we can to prevent shark attacks. But I feel like in most cases we're not really looking at shark attacks (shark attacks being the few and far between large attacks like 9/11, Nice, Stockholm, etc.) but more so at a smaller stream of fish that might have similar sized, similarly colored fish in them that are predatory in nature. They're hard to find, naturally, and even if you find one, there are ten more for that one you just caught.

That doesn't mean we should try, but things are a bit different than many people think. You seem to be aware of that though.

As for paranoia, I also agree, it's the job to be a bit paranoid of the government. But... I should explain that I study safety and security management so my position in this is a bit different perhaps. This thing you're describing is the paradox of security versus privacy. It's a really standard thing but the rule is that you always trade like so; security <-----------------> privacy. For every step towards security you take, your citizens will have less privacy, and for every step towards privacy.. you get the point. There are things that suddenly push a country to either side, for example the 9/11 attacks pushed America and its' citizens HEAVILY towards the security, resulting in PATRIOT act which Americans are still suffering from because as it turns out that act was supposed to last just during the war, but then they thought 'oh shit we can use this to monitor our own people.. nice' and kept it. It was never meant for that but here we are.

It's smart though, I'll give them that. As a citizen, I'm naturally against these kind of malpractices, but if I were them? Holy shit, I'd be rolling in the transcripts from everyone's facebook feeds, emails, phonecalls, etc. It's genius.

If you vet potential immigrants properly, you minimize the risk of admitting future murderers -- and then you get to add some real brains and goodness to your list of national resources.

That's still stupid. You're creating brain-drain and making that place have worse living conditions, and you are creating more divide in the world in quality of life, with subsequently more pollution and such. So you're still wrong.

.

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Or maybe their country of origin created the brain drain by failing to implement effective policies that would motivate their citizens to stay there.

Andre is right but he isn't thinking big enough! Forget brain drains across borders, people should be embargoed from leaving their home towns. I mean it just creates a brain drain! No one should move ever, or at least not without their Lords permission.

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That's still stupid. You're creating brain-drain and making that place have worse living conditions, and you are creating more divide in the world in quality of life, with subsequently more pollution and such. So you're still wrong.

what do I care what happens to the country they came from? I'M AN AMERICAN! If you legally immigrated, YOU'RE AN AMERICAN TOO! So the two of us are the only people I care about in this scenario. Immigration policy as altruism -- you're right -- that's totally backwards, and it probably does more harm than good. But I don't expect my government to be altruistic. I want America to do what is best for America. If that means brain-draining Cambodia, you know, I'll bring the chopsticks.

Insofar as immigration benefits my country, I am totally in favor of immigration. This will necessarily result in a better life for those who immigrate, which is fantastic and all, but that's not my point at all. My purpose is national self-interest.

This thing you're describing is the paradox of security versus privacy. It's a really standard thing but the rule is that you always trade like so; security <-----------------> privacy. For every step towards security you take, your citizens will have less privacy, and for every step towards privacy.. you get the point.

Generally/simply, yes. Specifically/precisely, I think it's missing the mark a bit... There's no intrusion on privacy (well not publicly at least). A policy has been created to monitor public speech via social media. The spectrum doesn't really apply, because there was never any reasonable expectation of privacy in the first place.

Now take something like British web police -- that's a security vs. privacy matter. The US policy doesn't really do anything like that yet, though it's not hard to imagine taking that step after this one.