Posted tagged ‘Welfare’

« WarSclerotic home page

Germany Needs An Extra 2,000 Judges and Prosecutors to Process Fivefold Increase in Terror Cases

December 25, 2017

Germany Needs An Extra 2,000 Judges and Prosecutors to Process Fivefold Increase in Terror Cases, Breitbart, Jack Montromery, December 24, 2017

Sean Gallup/Getty Images

Germany also faces more longstanding issues with immigration: between 43 and 48 per cent of the country’s substantial ethnic Turkish population — which has been growing steadily since the introduction of a special ‘guest worker’ programme in the 1960s and now numbers in the millions — is ‘economically inactive’, with German media reporting the “vast majority … declare that — at least for the moment — they are not interested in a job.”

***********************************

Germany’s judicial system is groaning under the strain of an explosion in terror cases since Chancellor Angela Merkel opened the door to unlimited numbers of migrants in 2015.

The German Attorney-General opened a shocking 1,200 terror cases in 2017, of which around 1,000 were related to radical Islamic terrorism, Tagesschau reports.

This represents a fivefold increase on 2016, when the figure stood at around 250 — with roughly 200 cases being related to radical Islam.

Sven Rebehn, the head of the German association of judges, has warned that the system is struggling to cope with the sheer volume of its expanded caseload, with burden particularly heavy in the migrant hotspots of Berlin, Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, and Hamburg

The judicial federation has calculated that around 2,000 additional judges and prosecutors are needed if the country hopes to tackle the growing terror threat and clear the backlog, or else face real difficulty in the near future.

Migrants have not only increased the workload of the courts in the field of terrorism — for example, 91 per cent of a 48 per cent surge in Bavarian rape cases was attributed to migrants in September 2017.

But the costs of expanding the judicial system’s capacity to absorb the surge in terror cases is not the only expense to fall on Germany as a consequence of mass migration.

The cost of the country’s more recent arrivals was predicted to reach close to 100 billion euros by 2020 last year — with the figure likely to have increased since then.

Germany also faces more longstanding issues with immigration: between 43 and 48 per cent of the country’s substantial ethnic Turkish population — which has been growing steadily since the introduction of a special ‘guest worker’ programme in the 1960s and now numbers in the millions — is ‘economically inactive’, with German media reporting the “vast majority … declare that — at least for the moment — they are not interested in a job.”

Categories: German courts, Germany open borders, Islamic integration, Islamic invasion, Islamic terrorism, Multiculturalism, Turks in Germany, Welfare
Tags: , , , , , , ,

Comments: 2 Comments

Trump endorses new immigration bill to cut green-card limits, favor English speakers

August 2, 2017

Trump endorses new immigration bill to cut green-card limits, favor English speakers, Washington Times, Dave Boyer and Stephen Dinan, August 2, 2017

Immigrant-rights groups accused Mr. Trump of catering to “white nationalists,” saying that non-white immigrants are far more prevalent among low-skilled, poor English-speaking immigrants who would be disadvantaged under the points system.

The measure would prohibit new immigrants from collecting welfare, which Mr. Trump called “a very big thing.”

*****************************

President Trump threw his support Wednesday behind a Senate bill that would cut legal immigration in half and implement a new merit-based system that emphasis English-speaking immigrants who can demonstrate job skills.

Meeting at the White House with GOP Sens. David Perdue of Georgia and Tom Cotton of Arkansas, the bill’s sponsors, the president said the revised legislation “would represent the most significant reform to our immigration system in half a century.”

The measure, known as the RAISE Act, “will reduce poverty, increase wages and save taxpayers billions and billions of dollars,” Mr. Trump said.

 The legislation would slash legal immigration in half, to 500,000 per year, over the next decade. The senators said it would replace the current permanent employment-visa framework with a skills-based system that rewards applicants based on their individual merits.

Mr. Cotton said the current immigration system is “an obsolete disaster” in which only 1 immigrant in 15 comes to the U.S. because of their job skills.

“I think it’s a symbol that were’ not committed to working-class Americans,” Mr. Cotton said of the current system.

The new system would reward education, English-language ability, high-paying job offers, past achievements, and entrepreneurial initiative. The White House said it would be similar to the merit-based immigration systems used by Canada and Australia.

The measure prioritizes immediate family members of U.S. residents, including spouses and minor children, but would end preferences for extended family members and adult children.

Mr. Trump said the U.S. has for decades issued green cards to “record numbers of low-wage immigrants,” and said it puts pressure on unskilled workers who are U.S. citizens already.

“It has not been fair to our people, to our citizens, and to our workers,” the president said.
He said the new system would “favor applicants who can speak English, financially support themselves and their families, and demonstrate skills that will contribute to our economy.”

Americans are divided on the right level of legal immigration. About 40 percent want to see the numbers cut, while another 40 percent want them to stay the same. The remaining 20 percent want to see increases.

The U.S. system is widely seen as broken, however, with immigrants — both legal and illegal — often having more say in the matter than the government itself. Extended families, business relationships and even a random lottery are used to award permanent visas.

Congress has pondered imposing a points system before, a decade ago, when then-President George W. Bush pushed for a massive overhaul that also would have legalized illegal immigrants. That bill died in the Senate.

Immigrant-rights groups accused Mr. Trump of catering to “white nationalists,” saying that non-white immigrants are far more prevalent among low-skilled, poor English-speaking immigrants who would be disadvantaged under the points system.

“Let’s call it as we see it: this is a white nationalist agenda masquerading as a bill about skill levels,” said Frank Sharry, executive director of America’s Voice.

The measure would prohibit new immigrants from collecting welfare, which Mr. Trump called “a very big thing.”

“They’re not going to come in and immediately go and collect welfare.They can’t do that,” he said.

The president of Numbers USA, a group seeking tighter immigration limits, said the legislation “will do more than any other action to fulfill President Trump’s promises as a candidate to create an immigration system that puts the interests of American workers first.”

“Our recent polling confirms that American voters overwhelmingly want far less immigration because they know mass immigration creates unfair competition for American workers,” said the group’s president, Roy Beck. “Seeing the president standing with the bill’s sponsors at the White House gives hope to the tens of millions of struggling Americans in stagnant jobs or outside the labor market altogether.”

The modern U.S. immigration system was established in 1965 when Congress decided the country should broaden traditional avenues of entry, abolish nationality quotas and expand family reunification.

The result was a system where about two-thirds of the green cards issued each year are for immediate relatives of U.S. citizens, while employment green cards account for about 15 percent. Refugees and asylees also account for about 15 percent.

Then there’s the diversity visa lottery, established in 1990, which doles out green cards based on chance. The goal was to give potential immigrants who don’t have family ties or job prospects a shot at making it to the U.S.

The new bill would nix the lottery, with the Trump administration saying it “serves questionable economic and humanitarian interests.”

The new bill would also limit permanent resident status for refugees to 50,000 a year, which the White House says is in line with the average over the past 13 years.

Cornell University Law School professor Stephen Yale-Loehr, who studies immigration policy, said the chances of Congress approving the legislation in the next two years are slim.

“It has been very hard for Congress to fix our broken immigration system,” he said. “Like health care reform and tax reform, immigration reform is complex and controversial.”

Categories: RAISE Act, Trump and legal immigration, U.S. Congress, Welfare
Tags: , , ,

Comments: Be the first to comment

Hugh Fitzgerald: Those Danish Right-Wing “Racists,” Their “Harsh” Demands and “Hate” Speech

September 8, 2016

Hugh Fitzgerald: Those Danish Right-Wing “Racists,” Their “Harsh” Demands and “Hate” Speech, Jihad Watch, , September 8, 2016

denmark-migrant-and-native

The other day the New York Times published a story about how Danes are souring on Muslim immigrants, and how some feel guilty about it:

Johnny Christensen, a stout and silver-whiskered retired bank employee, always thought of himself as sympathetic to people fleeing war and welcoming to immigrants. But after more than 36,000 mostly Muslim asylum seekers poured into Denmark over the past two years, Mr. Christensen, 65, said, “I’ve become a racist.”

He believes these new migrants are draining Denmark’s cherished social-welfare system but failing to adapt to its customs. “Just kick them out,” he said, unleashing a mighty kick at an imaginary target on a suburban sidewalk. “These Muslims want to keep their own culture, but we have our own rules here and everyone must follow them.”

When Christensen says “I’ve become a racist,” he has internalized the false charge made by Muslims, and their willing collaborators, that those who are sensibly anxious about Islam are “racists.” Since that scare-word automatically consigns one to the outer darkness, when even perfectly intelligent people with perfectly reasonable grievances turn that word on themselves, it is clear that something is amiss. Mr. Christensen needs to be unapologetic for his views, and he should start by watching his language: Islam is not a race, antipathy to Muslims does not constitute “racism.” Leave that word alone.

If Mr. Christensen wishes to feel guilty, he ought to feel guilty only about what future generations of Danes will inherit: a country which, because of the numbers of Muslims allowed in during Mr. Christensen’s time, will be far more unpleasant, expensive, and physically dangerous for native Danes than it might otherwise have been.

As the Times story notes, “Denmark, a small and orderly nation with a progressive self-image, is built on a social covenant: In return for some of the world’s highest wages and benefits, people are expected to work hard and pay into the system. Newcomers must quickly learn Danish — and adapt to norms like keeping tidy gardens and riding bicycles.”

But just look at how the Times reporter then slants the story at every point: “The center-right government has backed harsh measures targeting migrants, hate speech has spiked, and the anti-immigrant Danish People’s Party is now the second largest in Parliament.”

“Harsh measures targeting migrants,” “hate speech has spiked,” “anti-immigrant party.” It all sounds so terrible, until you ask a few questions.

What “harsh measures” are these? Apparently the “harshest” measure, passed in January, empowers the Danish authorities to confiscate valuables from new arrivals, both Muslim and non-Muslim, to offset the cost of settling them. It has seldom been enforced, and does not apply to the first $1,500 a migrant possesses.

Why exactly is this considered “harsh”? Should migrants not be expected to contribute, when they are capable of doing so? After all, they arrived uninvited, are immediately the recipients of a cornucopia of expensive benefits, and these benefits now flowing to them were paid for by generations of Danish taxpayers, who thought they were providing for poorer members of their own, that is Danish, society.

Is it “harsh” to require immigrants to pass exams in Danish? At present, only 72%, or a little more than 2/3, manage to learn even elementary Danish. Is it “harsh” to make immigrants take a citizenship exam, requiring them have studied the laws and mores of the Danes, given that they have the great good fortune to have been admitted to this peaceful pleasant land? Is it wrong to require immigrants to study the history of Denmark, since they have decided they’ve come to Denmark to stay? If the goal is to integrate these foreigners, the free courses and tests required will only further that goal.

And why are these putatively “harsh” measures described as “targeting immigrants,” rather than, in less loaded words, described simply as “applying to immigrants”? Since these are measures to further the successful integration of immigrants, of course they apply only to — but do not “target,” which has a distinctly menacing ring — immigrants. As to the casual assertion that “hate speech has spiked,” where is the evidence for this? Since not a single example of such “hate speech” appears in the entire Times piece, the reader must simply take it on faith that Danes – again labelled as “right-wing” – have been guilty of “hate speech.”

Let’s try to figure out what the reporter had in mind as conceivable “hate speech.” Suppose a member of the Danish People’s Party points out that Muslim Somalis in Denmark commit ten times as many crimes per capita as native Danes. That is a statement of fact, not “hate speech.” Or suppose a member of the Danish People’s Party notes that Muslim immigrants receive a much larger benefits package, and for a longer period, given their high unemployment, as compared to what non-Muslim immigrants and native Danes receive. Would that be “hate speech,” or simply a statement of fact?

“There is new tension between Danes still opening their arms and a resurgent right wing that seeks to ban all Muslims and shut Denmark off from Europe.”

So the reporter sees a Morality Play with two kinds of Danes: the Good Danes, “still opening their arms,” and the Bad Danes, “a resurgent right wing that seeks to ban all Muslims.” But even the Good Danes did not invite the Muslims in, and never quite were “opening their arms.” And even if the Bad Danes want to end Muslim immigration, none have as yet called for removing all of the Muslims already in Denmark. Not quite a Morality Play.

The Times reporter continues:

There is tension, too, over whether the backlash is really about a strain on Denmark’s generous public benefits or a rising terrorist threat — or whether a longstanding but latent racial hostility is being unearthed.

First, what does it mean to write “there is tension” over whether the “backlash” is about “a strain on generous public benefits” OR “a rising terrorist threat”? “Tension” over trying to apportion blame for the anxiety Muslims have caused? Why can’t there be anxiety among Danes about both the cost to their welfare system of Muslim migrants, and about the threat of Islamic terrorism to their very lives? Why can’t there be more than one reason for growing antipathy to Muslim migrants in Denmark?

And then there is that other proffered reason, which Muslims and their apologists find much to their liking: Could anxiety about the effect of Muslim migrants on Danish society reveal “a longstanding but latent racial hostility”? Just think, this “racial hostility” has been so longstanding but so very latent that no one noticed it, and strange to say, now that the Danes have revealed themselves as “racists,” their “racism” apparently doesn’t apply to all black people, for black African Christians in Denmark have rarely had any troubles, while, strange to say, even white Muslims (as from Syria) have engendered antipathy. So this hostility must have to do not with race but with Islam. The Danes are not revealing “racial hostility,” but well-grounded fears about Islam and the behavior of Muslims. Those who talk about a “latent racial hostility” in this famously tolerant country are deliberately trying to make the Danes feel guilty about their well-justified fears, and to deflect attention away from Islam

The Times reporter does concede that “perhaps the leading — and most substantive — concern is that the migrants are an economic drain. In 2014, 48 percent of immigrants from non-Western countries ages 16 to 64 were employed, compared with 74 percent of native Danes.” There then follows the sensible comments of immigration officials about the need to avoid “parallel societies,” and the story of one Muslim immigrant family’s success (but no similar stories about the many cases of immigrant unemployment and crime), that of an Iraqi engineer who allows his children to eat pork at school, and who with his family attends church to learn about Christianity. How typical do you think this Muslim immigrant family is?

This report from Denmark, with its loaded words – “right-wing,” “hate speech,” “targeting immigrants,” “harsh measures” – does not leave much room for thoughtful analysis of what is clearly a grave problem everywhere in Western Europe. That problem, let me repeat, is that Muslim migrants, in large numbers (one million arrived in Germany alone in 2015), have been moving into Europe, bringing Islam with them in their mental luggage, putting great strain on the welfare systems of every country in which they end up, and on the criminal justice systems because of their sky-high crime rate, and, given Muslim terrorist attacks in nearly a dozen Western countries, on the security services too.

Yet it is amazing that even now, after all the murder and mayhem that has been committed by Muslims, and not only those of ISIS who dutifully cite Islamic texts to justify their every act, people in Denmark are embarrassed to admit to an anxiety about Islam, and instead accuse themselves (“I’ve become a racist”) rather than ask what it is about the ideology of Islam that makes it uniquely difficult, perhaps even impossible, for Muslim migrants – always with a few remarkable exceptions — to integrate.

That is the question to be asked again and again: what explains the success of so many non-Muslim immigrants in managing to integrate into many different European countries, and the failure of so many Muslim immigrants to do so in those same countries? And why do the peoples of Western Europe allow themselves to feel so apologetic about their anxiety about, and antipathy toward, Islam? And when will we, the world’s Infidels, dare to study the texts that explain Muslim acts and attitudes, or shall we forever deny ourselves the right to engage in such study, that is, from doing the one thing that makes the most sense?

Categories: Denmark, Hate speech, Islam - submission, Islam in Europe, Islamic culture, Islamic integration, Islamic invasion, Islamic supremacy, Islamisation, Language, Media and Islam, Welfare
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Comments: Be the first to comment

Polygamy: Europe’s Hidden Statistic

June 5, 2016

Polygamy: Europe’s Hidden Statistic, Gatestone Institute, Judith Bergman, June 5, 2016

♦ The sheer volume of polygamous marriages shows that such marriages are also entered into in Europe, in secret, through Islamic marriage ceremonies conducted by imams. In most European countries, imams are not required to report these marriages to the authorities.

♦ Daham Al Hasan fled from Syria to Denmark, leaving behind his three wives and 20 children. Under the Danish rules of family unification, one of his wives and eight of his children have joined him in Denmark. But Al Hasan wants all his children with him, as well as all his wives. Lawyers estimate that the remaining wives will be able to join their children in Denmark. The case has caused a shock not only because of what it will cost the Danish state just in child allowance, but because Al Hassan claims that he is too ill to work or even learn Danish. “I don’t only have mental problems, but also physical problems…” He has admitted that his “mental illness” consists of missing the children he voluntarily left behind.

♦ Even if theoretically women can go to the police or press charges, they run the risk of being beaten or possibly divorced. Women’s shelters are “full of Muslim women.”

♦ The spokeswoman of Germany’s Federal Employment Agency said that the establishment of a central registry of Islamic marriages would be helpful for investigating claims of fraud.

A few years ago, Sweden’s Center Party, one of the four parties in the center-right governing coalition at the time, proposed legalizing polygamy. The idea caused outrage; the proposal was dropped. The party’s youth division, however, refused to let go: “We think it is important for the individual to decide how many people he or she wants to marry,” said Hanna Wagenius, head of Center Youth, predicting that polygamy would be legal in ten years, when her generation would enter parliament and make sure of it.

Sweden is not the only place in Scandinavia where “idealistic” youths have advocated polygamy. In 2012, the youth division of Denmark’s Radikale Venstre Party (“Radical Left”), then part of the governing coalition in Denmark, also proposed that polygamy should be legalized in Denmark. The move came four years after an Iraqi asylum seeker, who had worked for the Danish military in Iraq as a translator and then fled to Denmark, arrived with two wives. As Denmark does not recognize bigamy and as he refused to divorce his second wife, he returned to Iraq. “It is unacceptable that we are so narrow-minded in Denmark, and will not help a man who has helped us. We want to do something about that,” Ditte Søndergaard, head of Radikale Venstre Youth, said at the time. The proposal, however, did not find favor with any of the other political parties.

As far-fetched as these proposals may sound, they signify the shifts taking place in the West regarding fundamental ethical issues of gender equality and the willingness to accommodate Islamic sharia law. They are also proof of an enduring willful blindness to the detrimental effects of the practice of polygamy, not only in terms of financial costs to the state, but also to the Muslim women and children, whose rights these young politicians purport to support.

Muslim polygamy is only rarely debated in the media. The practice, therefore, despite its spread across the European continent — spanning, among other countries, Sweden, Denmark, the UK, Germany, France and the Netherlands — continues largely to hide under the public radar. As the practice is illegal across the continent and therefore not supposed to exist, there are no official statistics of polygamous marriages anywhere in Europe.

Several countries, such as the UK, the Netherlands, Sweden and France, nevertheless recognize Muslim polygamous marriages if they were contracted abroad under certain circumstances, such as if polygamy is legal in the country where the marriage took place. It is estimated that as many as 20,000 polygamous Muslim marriages exist in Britain. In France, as polygamy was legal until 1993, the minimum estimate as early as 2006 was around 20,000 polygamous marriages. In Germany, it was estimated in 2012 that, in Berlin alone, 30% of all Arab men were married to more than one wife.

In April, Swedish professor Göran Lind argued that it was time to “put one’s foot down” regarding polygamy in Sweden, after it was disclosed that Sweden had recognized “hundreds” of polygamous marriages contracted abroad. Professor Lind pointed out that polygamy is not compatible with Swedish law, especially the principles of equal treatment of spouses, the equality of all human beings, and the prohibition against discrimination on the basis of gender, as codified in the European Convention on Human Rights. One might add to those the principles enshrined in the UN’s Convention on the Elimination of All Discrimination Against Women, article 16, according to which,

“States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in all matters relating to marriage and family relations and in particular shall ensure, on a basis of equality of men and women:

“(a) The same right to enter into marriage;

“(b) The same right freely to choose a spouse and to enter into marriage only with their free and full consent.”

Considering how much time leading European politicians spend on assuring their electorates of their dedication to human rights, their tacit acceptance of these glaring violations of women’s rights, as enshrined in the above conventions, which polygamy constitutes, is rather peculiar.

The sheer volume of polygamous marriages, however, attests to the fact that such marriages are also entered into in Europe, in secret, through Islamic marriage ceremonies conducted by imams. In most European countries, imams are not required to report these marriages to the authorities. Therefore, despite the probable knowledge of the authorities, this illegal practice is basically allowed to flourish unhindered. As Islamic marriage does not legally exist in Europe, the woman entering into the union is left legally stranded and vulnerable with no means — other than the local imam or sharia council — of getting out of the marriage. Even if women can theoretically go to the police or press charges, they run the risk of being beaten or possibly divorced. Women’s shelters are “full of Muslim women,” as Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who worked in them, attests.

Polygamous Muslim marriages are bound to become an even bigger problem in the wake of the migrant crisis.

In Denmark these days, Daham Al Hasan is making headlines. He has twenty children with three wives, but two years ago fled alone from Syria to Denmark, and left his wives and children behind. Recently, under the Danish rules of family unification, one of his wives and eight of his children have joined him in Denmark. But Al Hasan wants all his children with him, as well as all his wives. He has been granted permission for nine additional children to join him, but as Denmark does not allow polygamy, the two remaining wives, under the same rules of family unification, are not permitted to join him. Lawyers, however, estimate that the remaining wives will also be able independently to join their children in Denmark, once they are there.

The case has caused rather a shock in Denmark, not only because of the extraordinary size of the family, and what it will cost the Danish state just in child allowance, but because Al Hassan claims that he is too ill to work or even to learn Danish. “I don’t only have mental problems, but also physical problems”, he says by way of explanation, “My back and my legs hurt.” He has admitted that his “mental illness” consists of missing the children he voluntarily left behind. This means that he and his family live exclusively off the Danish taxpayers’ money.

What is noteworthy about the current debate, however, is what is not being debated: namely that Al Hassan is a polygamist. While it is only natural that politicians and citizens feel violated and aggrieved about the financial costs to the Danish state, they should be equally concerned about the practice of polygamy. Yet not a single Danish feminist has spoken out about it.

In the television documentary, “Sharia in Denmark”, several imams recorded on a secret camera answered in the affirmative and without the least hesitation the question of whether a woman’s husband was allowed to take another wife against his first wife’s wish. For them, in fact, despite the fact that they live in a country where bigamy and polygamy are prohibited, for a man to take a second, third or fourth wife regardless of what any of them thought, seemed perfectly natural.

A qualitative study about Muslim women in Denmark from 2009, performed by Tina Magaard for the Danish Ministry of Welfare, documented the practice of polygamy among Danish Muslims. One Turkish woman told the interviewers:

“A growing group of women marries a man who is already married. They get married by an imam because then they become more accepted. Apparently, they have no alternative. They become ostracized if they were divorced and are on their own. Many would rather live a life where they get an identity — then they belong somewhere and then they are accepted. And it is sad that it exists in Denmark. I think if they could count the numbers, which is very difficult, they are probably much higher than we think.”

Another woman, a Muslim convert, said:

“This [polygamy] is something that I have really seen a lot of, there was a period when it became fashionable. I think it was five or six years ago, it was crazy, I think almost every second couple I knew, the man got himself an extra wife. But then, after a year or so, he regretted it or he divorced the first wife. I actually think there were twelve from my circle of friends where the husband got himself another wife.”

In a German documentary from 2013, the journalists found that Muslim men used polygamy as a means to commit fraud and obtain more welfare benefits. The tactic was to have their wives claim at the Employment Center that they were single women who did not know the father of their children. The story works because Germany, like other European countries, has no way of ascertaining the existence of an Islamic marriage, especially as German law does not obligate women to inform the authorities of their marital status.

In the film, the journalists asked the spokeswoman of the Federal Employment Agency — the supervisor of the local Employment Agencies responsible for paying out welfare benefits — whether the Federal Employment Agency was aware of the many instances of fraud. The woman said that they were indeed aware of the polygamy and the ensuing fraud and even enumerated the places where it was rife: large cities in Western Germany, such as Berlin, Cologne and Frankfurt. The journalist then asked the woman why nothing was being done about it. “I believe these cultural differences are very sensitive, we are a very tolerant country,” the woman said. Asked whether the Federal Employment Agency was perhaps too tolerant, the woman said that indeed she herself was wondering how it will all end.

The woman then said that the establishment of a central registry of Islamic marriages would be most helpful and desirable, as it would make possible investigating claims of fraud; but that this was a matter for the politicians.

“How will it all end?” Not well.

1639

Categories: Europe, Fraud, Islam and women, Islamic integration, Islamic invasion, Islamisation, Polygamy, Rights of women, Welfare
Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Comments: Be the first to comment