Cut to the chase here, please. Do they continue to get more money as a Territory or start pulling their own weight as a state. I'd rather see them as a state.
Not unless we get to balance them out by acquiring the Western Canadian provinces. Remember that statehood confers them with 2 U.S. Senators plus some representatives in the House.
Again, I have not seen the document itself, but the significance of this is that for the first time in 107 years in general, and since the 1952 PR Constitution in particular, the Executive of the Federal Government has acknowledged:
1. That the United States of America maintains a colonial relationship with Puerto Rico, in the form of a territory under the plenary powers of the U.S. Congress under the territorial clause of the U.S. Constitution.
2. That the current political status of Puerto Rico and that four million American citizens in that territory are subject to the whims of Congress, making the United States of America lord and sovereign over a people that practically have no say over it.
3. The Executive has no authority over the final disposition of the issue, and defers to the sovereign over Puerto Rico, the Congress of the United States of America, to deal with the issue. This is legally true under the Treaty of Paris of 1898, which ceded Puerto Rico to the U.S. after the Spanish-American War.
4. And most important of all, it sentences that the "enhanced Commonwealth" aspirations of the status-quo supporters are un-constitutional and not negotiable. Therefore, that the only options are Statehood or independence. Since less than 5% of the people of Puerto Rico desires independence from the U.S., our great nation must get ready to admit its 51st State.
To answer your question, yes, to pull our own weight. Not that we haven't, but yes, in equal terms with the other 50.
The money we dole out to them as a territory is nothing compared to what they would cost us as a state. Three-fourths of the whole island would be eligible for welfare handouts of one kind or another because of their low income overall. How do you explain the concept of property tax and school tax to people who have never paid either? You know how much most of us here in the States hate to pay to live on the land we already bought and paid for. Besides, we cant afford to feed another 2 million mouths.
Cutting to the chase, PR is very poor compared to the median US, it is a different culture, and it's citizens can not vote for the US president.
Do you want them to? Bush would have lost.
Spend some time there...
wow... negative commentary actually didn't start until post #3... I'm amazed, my screen usually starts twittering as soon as CLL posts a Puerto Rico note.
Must be Christmas time, or something...
felici-DAAAAAAAAAAA-DES BORINQUEN!!!!
"I'd rather see them as a state."
brillant more electoral votes for Democrats
my opinion
let them go their own way as a nation
cut them off from monetary support