[ QUOTE ]
(there is a good chance that you come from an immigrant line, i most certainly do)

[/ QUOTE ]

I am first-generation ethnic immigrant.

[ QUOTE ]
Everytime there is a wave of immigrants, there are people who filp out about the end of the world caused by the evil Irish/Italian/black/arab/ people destroying our country. So far it has yet to happen.

[/ QUOTE ]

Historically, anti-immigrant sentiment has related to issues like jobs, intermarriage, etc. This is not the basis of my concern. My concern is narrowly limited to keeping out terrorists and terrorist sympathizers. While religious belief/nationality is an imperfect proxy for this, it is nevertheless a proxy (albeit one with an imperfect correlation). My anti-immigration views are anti-terrorist views, and religion/nationality is only the proxy I use to measure for terrorism.

[ QUOTE ]
Illegal Arab immigrants should be dealt with in the same way as any other illegal in our nation. To suggest they be treated any differently is outright racist and dumb.

[/ QUOTE ]

While I agree in theory with your statement, the fact is that resources are limited, and it should not be a national security priority to expel every illegal Mexican, Chinese, or Central American--until those groups start blowing up buildings. Muslims/Saudis/Pakistanis/etc. however, have shown a propensity to terrorism, thus expelling these illegals should be first priority. That is all I am saying.

[ QUOTE ]
I hope every one of the people you hope to treat like this sue the government until we are broke.

[/ QUOTE ]

Nice implicit self-hating Americanism, I see. Typical.

[ QUOTE ]
Citizens, native born or naturalized, are granted full rights and protection by the Constitution. Assuch they should not be subject to anything outside of due process.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree with this, within limits. Naturalized citizens, in fact, do not have the same guarantees as native born citizens. Naturalized citizenship can be, and has been (rarely), revoked. For example, former Nazis have had their naturalized citizenship stripped.

That said, I generally agree with you that we should be careful not to single out groups of citizens for special treatment, as we begin to run into problems. This is why I favor solutions like National ID. Let the government observe all of us--then based on statistical profiling (which is, by the way, extremely good at flagging certain terrorists), the government should dig deeper on certain citizens. At that point, religion/pre-naturalization nationality should be considered a "plus factor".

[ QUOTE ]
Regardless of their skin color, or the fact that they happen to be from a predomiantly Arab or Muslim nation.

[/ QUOTE ]

Unfortunately, profiling works. Soccer moms didnt hujack the planes. Young Arab/Pakistani males did.

[ QUOTE ]
Whats thepoint of America if it is going to be like every other tyrannical state in history?

[/ QUOTE ]

This is a slippery slope argument at its worst. Just because certain "liberties" get curtailed doesnt mean we become one giant gulag. The fourth amendment has developed plenty of exceptions to the search warrant/probable cause requirements--for example at national borders. Random drunk driving stops. Checks at the airport.

Look at a country like Israel. Undoubtedly "democratic" and "free" in the way you and I both agree on the term. But I promise you that if an Arab tries to fly on El Al, he gets extra scrutiny. Why? Because El Al security knows that profiling works--since the Hassidic jews dont happen to be hijacking too many planes.

The reality is that we CAN make all sorts of sensible changes that wont, as you so dramatically put it, "let the terrorists win." We will have to make many changes to our society to become safer. 40 years ago, airplane passengers were routinely permitted to board the cabin with rifles & shotguns, which they left in the cockpit during the flight. We no longer do this.

If you go to a major sporting event, there is a good chance you will pass through a metal detector and subject yourelf to a pat-down. The social security number, which was originally introduced with express limitations about how it was not to be a "national ID", has become the de-facto national ID in this country since without it you cant get credit, get insurance, get a loan, open a bank account, etc.

We've made all of these changes but our country today is as free as ever. Why? Because the cornerstones of liberty aren't found in the details. They are found in the free press, the independent judiciary, the balance of powers, the electoral process, etc.

Singling out a few higher profile Americans for some extra scrutiny won't turn is into an Orwellian nightmare by any means.

[ QUOTE ]
FYI, you realize that the term Muslim is a religious denomination, not a nationality. Hence you cant deport Muslims anywhere, you can deport Arabs to their nation of citizenship.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes obviously. And I recognize that the set of muslims is not coextensive with the set of arabs. Muslim is the overall risk factor--and within that group are arabs, pakistanis, indonesians, etc. Ideally we would screen for religion, but since we can't do that perfectly, nationality is the proxy. We need to re-inject ethnicity also to deal with situations like naturalized British/German/French muslims.