The immigration and refugee ban--Carter, Reagan, GWBush, Obama and Trump

White House documents show that former President Barack Obama banned people at least six times, 2011-2014; President Bill Clinton issued six immigrant bans; George W. Bush six immigrant bans; and former President Ronald Reagan four. And in 1980, former President Jimmy Carter banned Iranians after Tehran seized the U.S. embassy. (Washington Examiner, June 15, 2016)  We've had a Terrorist Travel Prevention Act since 1986. It was updated in February of last year (when Trump was not the President). "Have you traveled to, or been present in, Iraq, Syria, Iran, or Sudan on or after March 1, 2011?"

It was embarrassing. This morning  I watched Martha Raddatz interviewing/interrogating Sean Spicer, the president's spokesman. If she'd looked at the history of the law (those countries were designated by Obama) she could have looked alert and awake.

After decades of maligning Americans as homophobes and racists in school textbooks, films, theater, NPR, TV and internet, a nasty nation which stole the land from gentle aboriginals who only wanted to protect the environment and enjoy each other, after ginning up rape statistics to make us the most dangerous country on the planet and lying about poverty and income gap--now the left gets all kum ba ya, decides to read a few verses in the Bible after ridiculing Christians and stabbing Jews in the back, and says, "This is not who we are." All over a 30 year law which has been used by the last 4 presidents to fight terrorism.

 Calm down, Obama supporters, liberal pastors, and hysterical teachers and librarians. President Trump is only returning things to normal. Perhaps those waiting in line for years doing it the legal way will now have an opportunity. His "order temporarily halts refugee admissions for 120 days to improve the vetting process, then caps refugee admissions at 50,000 per year. Outrageous, right? Not so fast. Before 2016, when Obama dramatically ramped up refugee admissions, Trump’s 50,000 stands roughly in between a typical year of refugee admissions in George W. Bush’s two terms and a typical year in Obama’s two terms." With the media so twisted and biased, you will have a tough time remaining calm and informed, but at least you'll know more than you did the last 8 years. There was more coverage of the 12 people detained in JFK than there was of the half a million people marching for life the day before. http://www.nationalreview.com/article/444370/donald-trump-refugee-executive-order-no-muslim-ban-separating-fact-hysteria

 https://www.cbp.gov/travel/international-visitors/visa-waiver-program/visa-waiver-program-improvement-and-terrorist-travel-prevention-act-faq

Help for Syrian refugees, pt. 1

 Syria’s civil war has created the worst humanitarian crisis of our time. Half the country’s pre-war population — more than 11 million people — have been forced to flee their homes. I came across a Multi-faith alliance for Syria, an organization set up specifically to help them (don't know if it also receives federal money--many of these religious organizations do.

 http://www.hearttoheart.org/multifaith-alliance-kit-event/…/

Looking quickly through the website of MFA the support seems primarily from Jews, with some Christian denominations and para-church non-profits, a few Muslim, and I saw one Hindu group. I'll need to look more closely at the individual websites. The format of this list is rather shaky since it's too complicated to rewrite the HTML code, but here is the first half of the list. I'm going to spot check the website.  Some I know like Catholic Relief Services, Church World Service, ELCA, UCC.  Others not at all.

Ameinu (Our People)

American Jewish Committee 

American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee 

American Relief Coalition for Syria

Anti-Defamation League

Auburn Theological Seminary

B'nai Jeshurun, New York, NY 

Bronx Christian Fellowship Church, Bronx, NY

The Brotherhood Synagogue, New York, NY

Catholic Relief Services

Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA)

Church World Service

Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations 

Congregation Beit Simchat Torah, New York, NY

Congregation Beth El, South Orange, NJ

Congregation Kehillath Israel, Brookline, MA

CURE International 

The Edgar M. Bronfman Center for Jewish Student Life at NYU

Episcopal Relief & Development 

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

Foa & Son 

Global Ministries of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and

United Church of Christ

Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America

Heart to Heart International

HIAS 

Interfaith Center of NY 

International Refugee Assistance Project

Jamaica Muslim Center, Jamaica, NY

Jewish Coalition for Syrian Refugees 

Jewish Council for Public Affairs 

Jewish Federations of North America

Jewish Funders Network
The Jewish Theological Seminary

Jewish United Fund/Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago

Syrian relief groups, pt. 2

Multifaith Alliance for Syrian Refugees, pt. 2 (couldn't get the HTML to work) See part 1 here.

London School of Economics and Political Science: Faith Centre
Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service
Milstein Center for Interreligious Dialogue
National Council of Jewish Women
New York Board of Rabbis
New York Legal Assistance Group
North Carolina Hillel: UNC Chapel Hill
Orient for Human Relief
Rabbinical Assembly
Rahma Relief Foundation
Reform Judaism (UK)
Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism
The Riverside Church, New York, NY
Sadhana: Coalition of Progressive Hindus
Saint Peter's Lutheran Church, New York, NY
School for Creative Judaism
Syrian American Medical Society
Syrian American Rescue Network
Syrian Community Network
Syrian Emergency Task Force
Temple Beth El, Boca Raton, FL
Temple Beth Shalom, Palm Coast, FL
Temple Emanu-El, Closter, NJ
UJA-Federation of New York
Union for Reform Judaism
Union Theological Seminary
Unitarian Universalist United Nations Office
United Sikhs
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
U.S. Fund for UNICEF
Vassar College Refugee Solidarity
Ve'ahavta
World Jewish Congress
World Jewish Relief
World ORT