“Ben Carson said Sunday that most Syrian refugees would rather be relocated within their own country than resettled in the United States.” Really, he said that! If so, why have 3 million refugees left Syria for other countries, and why are millions more are trying to leave?
“The thing that I really learned in listening to the refugees themselves is their intense desire is to return to their country and [be] repatriated,” Carson said. Sure, but this assumes a safe and peaceful country to return to. That’s sort of the rub, isn’t it? Not that life was ever all that rosy under Assad’s dictatorship for many of them, but at least they weren’t being slaughtered en masse; at worst, they were being picked off one by one by Assad’s secret police. The situation in Syria now is a totally different ballgame.
Carson’s rhetoric is nothing more than a clumsy excuse for opposing resettlement of Syrian refugees in the United States. It’s really little more than an expression of the nativism, xenophobia, racism, and religious bigotry that typifies Republican thought and behavior. In this case, it isn’t even slick propaganda; it’s an absurd statement on its face. There wouldn’t be an issue to argue about if these refugees weren’t asking for refuge in the United States.
(Jeb Bush and Ted Cruz revealed the GOP’s true colors when they said only “Christian” Syrian refugees should be admitted. For them and many other Republicans, the real problem is that most of these refugees are Muslims.)
Carson needs to come up with some other rationalization for his shabby politics. This one won’t get off the ground.