U.S. cannot gamble on citizen safety and admit Syrian refugees
New York Times columnist Nicholas Krisof's piece on Sunday tried to tie the similarity between the possibility of the U.S. rejecting the Syrian refugees and the incident in 1939 involving Jews aboard the SS St. Louis, where our country refused entry of its passengers.
The following day a piece from the Miami Herald also discussed the similarity but in fairness contained a portion where even the surviving passengers of that voyage did not feel our refusal of the Syrians would be one in the same.
It's apples to oranges to most logical-thinking citizens. While I do not condone what was done in 1939 and our country has correctly apologized to the Jewish community for the incident, it was indeed a different time and different mindset.
The Jews aboard that ship did not pose a national security risk, but instead were sent away over misplaced pre-war perceptions brought to the forefront by our own beloved President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
On the other hand, allowing 10,000 (and our administration wants even more) poorly scrutinized Syrians into the country does pose a potential security risk. As we admittedly do have an adequate database to vet these refugees, we are basically taking their word that they are earnest in intent.
Most would agree a tougher scrutiny should take place. Terrorism, as such, was not a central factor in 1939. To say that there is not a potential terrorist among the refugees would be naive and gambling the wellbeing of our countrymen.
If allowed unchecked and just one terrorist event happens in this country as a result, the administration, but more importantly, the victims of the potential incident, would pay a heavy price.
The fallout would be devastating to the liberals and Democratic Party as a whole as this poor judgement would be front and center in every major election.
Mark Mullen
Bradenton
This story was originally published November 28, 2015 at 12:00 AM with the headline "U.S. cannot gamble on citizen safety and admit Syrian refugees ."