[sarcasm]

U.S.-Bound African Refugees Stuck in Post-9/11 Red Tape

[backhoe]

-"Pity About Africa..."--

[MEG33]

I never post on this topic because I feel so lacking in positive thinking.It is time for Africa to step up to the plate and stop the constant war.

[wretchard]

There's plenty of unemployed military power in the world. The armed forces of New Zealand, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Canada and Japan for example. Japan has the second largest military budget in the world after the USA. All that force, doing nothing in particular.

What is needed is a new leadership structure to harness the energies needed to maintain the existence of civilization, in places like Africa, Aceh, Burma, the Solomon Islands. There should be a real peacekeeping equivalent of Southcom, Northcom, Centcom, Atlantic command, Pacific command. Real headquarters that anticipate problems, gather intelligence, develop contingency plans, to which national forces can be chopped.

The UN is an obsolete Cold War organization which will never be able to meet this challenge. But the United States can take the lead in building up the structures needed to coordinate international efforts to bring peace to places where American military force is neither appropriate nor adequate in numbers. If we build it, they will come.

The United States armed forces are a premier military force which should be reserved for fighting the really tough bad guys. But even the Belgians, I feel, can handle the cannibals.

[ricpic]

And into this sinkhole our President is about to drop 15 billion of OUR dollars!

[LadyDoc]

I, and I suspect most Africans, am completely inured to reports of African suffering, for whatever cause.

Africans? Which tribe are you discussing?

Bantus feel deeply, but keep their emotions in check especially in front of strangers. When someone died in our hospital, they would scream and cry loudly, then quickly get up and coldly make arrangements to take the person home. (usually a baby or a child, since old people preferred to die at home).

But lack of emotion? No, because when I learned the language I would have mothers tell me sadly of how their firstborn died, or when their children were sick, or why they named their children. (My name was "troubles" because I was born in the year of famine. My 8 year old is named "Leave him" because he was born right after measles killed children in the village and we wante God to Leave him with us).

This stoicism is often interpreted by more direct tribes-- like the British immigrants or by the Boer tribe (du Toit is a Boer name) as lack of feeling.

it is not. It is a passivity in the face of what cannot be changed. The good part of this passivity is a quiet grace and deep feelings. The bad part is that common people do not fight back when a tyrant orders them to kill, or indeed when a tyrant kills them. The flip side of passivity is violence: witchcraft, poisoning, burning people in huts at night, and outbreaks of terrible wars.

When I worked in Africa, our German nuns would shake their heads about this violence. I usually replied, yes, sisters, you Germans were much more civilized and neat in your killings.

Finally, Africans, like other primitive peoples (such as Hindus, Baptists and Catholics) believe that death is not the end, but that the soul lives beyond death. This faith is much much deeper than many in the secularized west. So death is not an end, merely a passing over.

Cardinal Arinze says that what we can learn from Africa is how to pray. Indeed, African priests serve "heathens" in many countries, both in Africa, but also in Europe and in my own diocese. An African bishop is supporting the "anglican mission in America" to revive Christianity in the Anglican church. You see, in these countries, Christianity still has meaning.

During Idi Amin's atrocities, someone asked a visiting Anglican African bishop what he needed for his people. He said Roman collars. The American reporter asked why, thinking it was a vanity request. The bishop replied: We need the collar so that when they murder our people, they know we priests are still with them, and that God is there.

[11B3]

The other day I posted similar thoughts about Africa - basically "screw Africa, let them sink or swim on their own" - and some found that cruel. I agree with this author 100%.

BUMP

[Musket]

Not hard to understand. Wonder why GW doesn't get it?

[quebecois]

Although he addresses the immigration issue briefly, I think that it bears repeating. Besides staying the heck out of Africa, the West must make absolutely sure that Africa and the Middle East do not transplant themselves into our midst (as is currently happening). This also entails some sort of change in the West to stimulate our pathetic birth rate. If we continue to have 1.1 children per woman (as in Spain and Italy), Africa and the Middle East will eventually overrun us, regardless of immigration laws.

Africa must sort out its own problems, or wither on the vine. But we cannot allow Africa to take the West down with it.

[happygrl]

I note that several U.S. churches are attempting to bring groups of African refugees over to the United States, European churches the same for Europe. Mistake. Mark my words, this misplaced charity will turn around and bite us, big time.

Oh, so it's ok that HE comes here from Africa with his "life is cheap" attitudes, but don't let any of THOSE OTHERS in.

Some of these groups of refugees are persecuted Christians. I prefer their outlook to his aetheism.

What's this "us" business Kimosabe ?

"Us" are not all bigoted racists like you.

BTW Dennis, why are you posting this crap ?

[marktwain]

It has certainly got worse since 1960, when most African countries achieved independence. We, and by this I mean the West, have tried many ways to help Africa. All such attempts have failed.

It seems that colonialism worked, at least for a time. It is hard to escape the conclusion that African independence has been a big mistake.

[fporretto]

Kim Du Toit is dead on target. But then, he seldom misses.

Some wag once said that Africa was not a continent but a condition of the mind, and that it would remain forever incomprehensible to the West for that reason. Du Toit's essay points up some of the central factors in that disconnect.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit the Palace Of Reason:
http://palaceofreason.com

[tdadams]

Wow. This is harsh, but sadly all too honest. I'm aquainted with some African refugees, from Somalia, Nigeria, and Zimbabwe. They all seem to have a casual disregard for life, as if the death of a human is no different than the death of a possum or a bug. "It happens" seems to be the attitude.

[Centurion2000]

bump

[LaMudBug]

After the wall around Africa is finished, then one should be build around Israel and the Palestinans and furnished with all the guns and ammunition they can use over a ten year period.

At the end of ten years, we will peek over the wall to see if there is a survivor.

[usslsm51]

Surley this is not "ROOTS".

[Im Your Huckleberry]

Absolutely.

Every single nation where the guilty white westerners have allowed the native population to take over has seen that nation fall into savagery and barbarism.

The western liberals advocated the overthrow of South Africa's government and apartheid...and now South Africa is descending into the same third world hell of most other nations on the continent. South Africa is now the rape capital of the world. Crime is out of control. The white population are being killed, raped, robbed, and assaulted at record levels and you hear nothing in the western papers. Yes, the leftist, liberal vermin don't want you to know that their "multicultural Utopia" actually has descended into Dante's Inferno...

And every other nation taken over by the native blacks in Africa has turned into a violent, savage, hell hole - a total kleptocracy.

Uganda, Rwanda, Namibia, Nigeria, and Mugabe's Zimbabwe.

I say we leave these barbarians to themselves and let the savages work it out. Sink or swim. Not another western dime should go into that continent.

It's too late for the poor European whites in places like Zimbabwe and South Africa, but we shouldn't do any more to prop up these governments.

[hemogoblin]

Read Heart of Darkness; Conrad was saying similar things in 1901.

I visited South Africa as a little kid in 1977 (I think Vorster was PM); it was a gorgeous place, then. My Dad and I met a white farming family from (then) Rhodesia. Nicest guy in the world, with about 5 children who all knew how to use the automatic weapons in the house.

I wonder where they all are now.

[Billy_bob_bob]

Excellent article, thanks for posting it. Couldn't agree more.

[JoeSchem]

It sounds dreadful to say it, but if the entire African continent dissolves into a seething maelstrom of disease, famine and brutality, that's just too damn bad. We have better things to do--sometimes, you just have to say, "Can't do anything about it."

Giving up is not the Christian way. If the Muslims and pagans want to leave, fine. But God doesn't call Christians to give up on people, let alone entire continents.