Puerto Rico's new Governor demands statehood; US should cut it loose

[ifrtbttrflys]

This is 2017: colonialism and territory stuff is so 20th century old news. Puerto Rico is just about sunk financially, with thousands of Puerto Ricans abandoning its listing ship every year.

Puerto Rico is a territory of the United States, and all Puerto Ricans are considered statutory US citizens at birth, meaning that the Constitution doesn't guarantee their citizenship, but current US law does:

Sec. 302. [8 U.S.C. 1402] All persons born in Puerto Rico on or after April 11, 1899, and prior to January 13, 1941, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, residing on January 13, 1941, in Puerto Rico or other territory over which the United States exercises rights of sovereignty and not citizens of the United States under any other Act, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States as of January 13, 1941. All persons born in Puerto Rico on or after January 13, 1941, and subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, are citizens of the United States at birth.

The clamoring out of San Juan today is tainted with victim hood and collective socialism; sense the militant tone in what the new Governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo Rossello, proclaimed yesterday (Monday, January 2, 2017) at his inauguration:

"The United States cannot pretend to be a model of democracy for the world while it discriminates against 3.5 million of its citizens in Puerto Rico, depriving them of their right to political, social and economic equality under the U.S. flag," Rossello said in his inaugural speech, delivered in Spanish. "There is no way to overcome Puerto Rico's crisis given its colonial condition."

https://www.mail.com/news/politics/...mises-push-statehood.html#.7518-stage-hero1-9

I say, "fine", and recommended passing and enacting legislation that repeals Puerto Ricans becoming US citizens at birth, and cutting Puerto Rico totally loose and allowing them to sink or swim in glorious independence as an island nation dependent on no one but themselves.

Puerto Rico is almost 1K miles south of Florida.

America "won" Puerto Rico, along with Cuba, Guam and the Philippines (the Philippines also at a cost of $20 million paid by the US to Spain) in the 1898 Treaty of Paris as victors of the Spanish-American War.

Cuba gained formal independence from the US in 1902.

The Philippines gained full independence from the US in 1946 after WWII.

Guam is an island in Micronesia, in the Western Pacific, a little over 7k miles from the US west coast and almost 4k miles from Hawaii.

Guam proved to be a pivotal possession during WWII, with the Japanese invading and defeating the US garrison there the day after they attacked Pearl Harbor; the US retook its territory in 1944 and then built five airfields on it to serve as a jumping point for B29s to bomb other islands in the western Pacific and mainland Japan. Guam is still a US territory, essentially America's most significant forward military post between The Aloha State and Asia, as Guam is home to both Naval Base Guam and Andersen Air Force Base. Guam celebrates its Liberation Day annually on July 21 - the day in 1944 when the Americans returned to eventually defeat the Japanese in The Second Battle of Guam (which turned out to be the last battle for Guam).

Obviously, then, there's some significant purpose and history between the US and Guam.

Just as obvious is that there is also some significant history between the US and Puerto Rico, although it's a bunch more dark.

Woodrow Wilson was the first US President to get legislation passed and then enacted to make Puerto Ricans US citizens: he needed Puerto Rican men among the bodies America would send off to WWI. And warm bodies for war was the same reason legislation was again passed and enacted in 1941, as Roosevelt geared up for WWII (which was ravaging already in Europe, Asia, and the Pacific).

On Nov. 1, 1950, just five years after WWII ended, two Puerto Rican nationalists attempted to assassinate President Truman with the cause of independence for Puerto Rico as their only reason. The President's protectors stopped the assassins from getting close to Truman, but one of the assassins managed to mortally wound one of the President's protectors, yet the officer didn't die until after he was able to return fire, killing the assassin. The surviving assassin was convicted and sentenced to death, which Truman commuted to life; the failed assassin's life term was commuted as time served and he was released in 1979 by President Jimmy Carter, free to return to Puerto Rico.

On March 1, 1954, four Puerto Ricans opened fire from a visitors' balcony of the chambers of the US House of Representatives, where 240 Reps of the 83rd Congress were in session: 5 were wounded, one of them seriously - all recovered. All four shooters - one a woman - were caught and convicted. On September 6, 1979, President Jimmy Carter commuted all four shooters' effective life sentences to time served, and they were released to return to Puerto Rico.

Obviously, there was a time when Puerto Ricans were willing to turn to terrorist assassination to try to win their independence, and the nationalist movement is still alive and well (albeit much less death-seeking).

I say it's high past time for Puerto Rico to set sail on its own and try to become whatever it deems to be as an independent nation. Heck, all they have to do is a Philippine Duerte and China'll immediately step in and help them out with all their financials failings.

NO TO PUERTO RICO STATEHOOD

BTW: if any majority of folks of any of the US territories desired and sought full independence, I'd be all for it - there can never be too much independence as far as sovereign nations are concerned, imo.

And if a majority of Hawaiians desired to reclaim their independence, and especially considering how it was stolen from them in the first place, I would most certainly be all for them, too.

 

[BotanyBoy]

"The United States cannot pretend to be a model of democracy for the world while it discriminates against 3.5 million of its citizens in Puerto Rico, depriving them of their right to political, social and economic equality under the U.S. flag," Rossello said in his inaugural speech, delivered in Spanish.

LOL a right to economic equality.....

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

"The United States cannot pretend to be a model of democracy for the world while it discriminates against 3.5 million of its citizens in Puerto Rico, depriving them of their right to political, social and economic equality under the U.S. flag," Rossello said in his inaugural speech, delivered in Spanish.

LOL a right to economic equality.....

At this point, you will probably not be surprised at how many people in the US see/hear a phrase like that with enthusiastic resonance.

 

[BotanyBoy]

At this point, you will probably not be surprised at how many people in the US see/hear a phrase like that with enthusiastic resonance.

Nah...it's common place thought along with the idea that we are a through and through simple majority mob rule democracy from top to bottom.

I don't know where they come up with this shit, or why they persist in it.

But they do....


Funny thing is they talk about economic equality, but they don't want anyone to be able to make money because capitalism is evil. All they want to do is ban industry or regulate it into the hands of the elites, then bitch about how rich they are.

It's fucking insane.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

The source is Germany circa 1865.


While we were engaged in blood-letting, their intellectuals were planting seeds that would be transplanted to the New World to become Fabian sprouts of Socialism...

 

[BotanyBoy]

The source is Germany circa 1865.


While we were engaged in blood-letting, their intellectuals were planting seeds that would be transplanted to the New World to become Fabian sprouts of Socialism...

I still don't understand why they seem to think the USA was meant to be a communist utopia.

 

[ifrtbttrflys]

I can't imagine even more than a few ignoramuses have ever thought America was meant to be socialist. It's much more like they're bound and determined to make America socialist - period.

Problem with that intent is there's still far too many people around who consider that piece of paper called the Constitution to be worth fighting and dying for - American style - and since the Constitution is naturally against their socialist agenda, all that's really left for the traitors to try is what they specialize in doing so well: covertly, disingenuously working around the Constitution to implement their socialist strategies anyway.

We're around 150 years into that socialist scam, the last 100 particularly heavy into it, and I don't recall reading or knowing of any better opportunity than now to start popping the air out of all of it. I am truly hoping that's the actual energy everyone is feeling all about these days.

Unfortunately, even if that energy is true, California will be one of the last places it will be quelled.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

I still don't understand why they seem to think the USA was meant to be a communist utopia.

Because they dream it.

I run across this all of the time, for whatever reason, Progressives will grudgingly admit that yes, it might have failed in the past, in other places, but this time it will work because we have 'evolved' technologically as a society. In Mises: The Last Knight of Liberalism, Jörg Guido Hülsmann details how this was the guiding thought in Austria as the enthusiastically adopted the framework of the German Social State including the Economic theory of the Socialists of the Chair (think Krugman).





Just in case you missed it:

http://www.nationalreview.com/node/443466/print

Victor Davis Hanson and Clarice Feldman are two of my favorite commentators on the state of current 'culture.' This is an example of what happens when you invest in "progress..."

[For those mentally challenged, Progressivism, i.e., the American Socialist label for Socialism because we kept rejecting that branding.]

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

I can't imagine even more than a few ignoramuses have ever thought America was meant to be socialist. It's much more like they're bound and determined to make America socialist - period.

Problem with that intent is there's still far too many people around who consider that piece of paper called the Constitution to be worth fighting and dying for - American style - and since the Constitution is naturally against their socialist agenda, all that's really left for the traitors to try is what they specialize in doing so well: covertly, disingenuously working around the Constitution to implement their socialist strategies anyway.

We're around 150 years into that socialist scam, the last 100 particularly heavy into it, and I don't recall reading or knowing of any better opportunity than now to start popping the air out of all of it. I am truly hoping that's the actual energy everyone is feeling all about these days.

Unfortunately, even if that energy is true, California will be one of the last places it will be quelled.

Beginning with Teddy and finding its footing with Woody Wilson, there has been an admiration among the American intellectual class with the idea of a robust Presidency and a "living" Constitution. There is a class of American, and it is bifurcated, those on the very top, and those on the very bottom, whom believe that a strong, centralized collective social welfare state will lead to a general prosperity that will replace a system of individualism where some people are allowed to be born with a silver spoon in their mouth whom will spend the totality of their lives and fortunes to oppress the poor.

 

[Hard_Rom]

Yeah, cut and run to save a few bucks!

 

[BotanyBoy]

Yeah, cut and run to save a few bucks!

They are progressive socialist....they will be better off without the evil white patriarchy oppressing them with their capitalism.

 

[KingOrfeo]

. . . and since the Constitution is naturally against their socialist agenda . . .

No, it isn't.

 

[Ms_Ann]

Maybe we can sell it to Cuba.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

They are progressive socialist....they will be better off without the evil white patriarchy oppressing them with their capitalism.

I laughed...

 

[KingOrfeo]

I hope nobody here objects to the possibility of a Spanish-speaking state of the Union.

 

[Liar]

Didn't Puerto Rico have a referendum on statehood not too long ago and voted no?

 

[KingOrfeo]

Didn't Puerto Rico have a referendum on statehood not too long ago and voted no?

No, that was in 2012 and they voted for statehood. Not binding on Congress, of course.

There are three political parties in Puerto Rico and they are defined by their position on PR's future political status, which appears to be the single most important political issue in PR. One party is for statehood, one for independence, one for continuing the status quo. The last option at least keeps other options open -- if PR ever becomes a state of the Union it will never be independent, if it becomes independent it will never be a state, but at present either remains possible.

 

[Wrong Element]

I can't imagine even more than a few ignoramuses have ever thought America was meant to be socialist. It's much more like they're bound and determined to make America socialist - period.

Problem with that intent is there's still far too many people around who consider that piece of paper called the Constitution to be worth fighting and dying for - American style - and since the Constitution is naturally against their socialist agenda, all that's really left for the traitors to try is what they specialize in doing so well: covertly, disingenuously working around the Constitution to implement their socialist strategies anyway.

Since socialism didn't exist when the Constitution was adopted, it is unlikely the framers meant to ban it.

I see that New Year's resolution of becoming less dumb in 2017 is off to a poor start.

 

[Liar]

No, that was in 2012 and they voted for statehood. Not binding on Congress, of course.

Ah yes you're right. They tried through the legislature in -14 but failed.

 

[Hard_Rom]

US constitution sounds awfully liberal and damn near utopian!

 

[ifrtbttrflys]

Since socialism didn't exist when the Constitution was adopted, it is unlikely the framers meant to ban it.

Where was it posted that "the framers meant to ban it."? Do you feel better having fabricated your own irrelevant point just to then call it "dumb"?

There exists a very simple illustration which all logical people can easily visualize themselves, so I'll paint a picture of it just for you:

Politics is simply the art of governing. All politics can be defined by where they weigh on a foundational, political teeter tooter: on one end of that teeter tooter sits socialism, on the exact opposite lies individual liberty.

The balance, obviously, is in the middle, so whatever flavor of politics weighs more on the socialism side defines it as some degree of socialism, as the opposite also exactly applies.

All forms of socialism, whatever their multitude of flavors, share the defining feature of authoritative power (government, monarch, dictator, whatever) over individual liberty - it's that simple.

In that specific regard, the framers most definitely incorporated socialism into the Constitution in the form of the omnipotent federal government the Constitution was birthed to create. However, as it applies to the political foundation teeter tooter illustration, that socialism was to be vigilantly held FULLY in check by the Constitution's deft, precise, and clear limits on that omnipotency and, most of all, by virtuous American citizens themselves.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

The declarative political foundation of America is anchored to the natural liberty of "the People" far and above any "Government"'s right to exist over it. That is why when any coherent-pondering individuals desire to speak of American politics, they knowledgeably begin from the individual liberty end of the teeter tooter, as that is the position the most patriotic of America's founders and framers started from.

America began betraying its gloriously revolutionary political foundation plank even as the framers convened and begin deliberating the crafting of the Constitution - and America is still paying most dearly for the socialist crimes of ignoring the natural, God-given right of individual liberty to all by tyrannically and sinisterly employing government omnipotent power to enslave individuals, to descimate and reservate individuals fully against their free wills.

Yet, despite those socialist crimes against humanity, America still has the opportunity to reverse its course; which, if it would, would instantly once more make it a greatly admired leader in world politics.

There is no more better solution to virtually all of the world's ills today than if America's federal government would first repledge it's full devotion to the natural right of individual liberty FIRST.

LET FREEDOM RING!

 

[BotanyBoy]

No, it isn't.

It absolutely is.

Socialism is anti individualism on a fundamental level.

The Constitution, the USA and American culture revolve around and borderline worship individualism over the collective (socialism).

That's why we've spent trillions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of lives fighting that evil shit.

Because it's fuckin' evil.....socialism = social/economic rape.

US constitution sounds awfully liberal and damn near utopian!

Then you've clearly never read the fucking thing, it's basically a big fancy retraining order on the government.

 

[BotanyBoy]

However, as it applies to the political foundation teeter tooter illustration, that socialism was to be vigilantly held FULLY in check by the Constitution's deft, precise, and clear limits on that omnipotency and, most of all, by virtuous American citizens themselves.

LOL

Not anymore, got a bunch of KO's running around selling everyone on the idea of a free lunch......

 

[ifrtbttrflys]

Socialists naturally abhor any reference to "virtue" as American patriotic framers considered the word in relation to, "...a republic, if you can keep it."

Socialists possess not an ounce of that sort of virtue. But they do inherently understand - especially after November 8, 2016 - just how many Americans are still serious about that sort of virtue.

Socialists understood that natural threat to their criminal political ideology before then, simply because, secularly, individual liberty and socialism have been natural governing enemies since men began living among each other. So, up until November 9, 2017, both socialists from within and socialists from without sated their collective comfort and security first selves by intentionally and disingenuously trying every way they could to socialistically circumvent the Constitution, instead of simply being overt about their criminal politics intent toward its declarative foundation built firmly upon individual liberty.

For the next two years at least, those criminal socialist efforts are totally busted...

Unless, of course, Trump chooses to fully service the devil, in which case he'll instantly find a gaggle of Republicans and Democrats already on their knees waiting for him to join them at socialism's glory hole.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

I hope nobody here objects to the possibility of a Spanish-speaking state of the Union.

We already have California...