To heck with adding them as a state, let them become their own country!!!
I could live with that!
It would save some time later when the USA breaks up anyways.
The next thing you know, they will want to grant statehood to Hawaii.....(s)
I am anti Peurto Rico statehood, but I am pro Preuto Rico Nationhood.
Haven’t the people of PR voted on this issue several times and always say no.
Why would they want to?
They get all the benefits of being a state and don’t pay taxes.
As O does his damage in Washington, is there an advantage in moving toward some kind of autonomy?
Something like the rest of us would have if the 10th ammendment was still operative...?
I don’t know that full independence would be an advantage necessarily (there is something to be said for even a weaked US constitution)... the current territory status probably leaves you having to obey every crazy federal rule that comes down the pike. Maybe something in-between, not quite but almost independent.
I think that PR should be made a state... part of the existing state of Florida.
But no way in heck should it be made a stand alone state with 2 Senators.
We don't need no more stinkin states.
Unfortunately PR statehood will mean 2 more Dem senators and 6-7 more Dem House members
Is the GOP that stupid with their fetish for Hispanics....and their disdain for Conservatives?
“Please read before flaming...”
No flaming here. I am not Hispanic and know no one in Puerto Rico or anyone of Puerto Rican heritage. But over the years, I’ve read enough on this issue.
I would really prefer that Puerto Rico not become a state. I believe, like other posters on this thread believe, that Puerto Rico would become a Dem stronghold.
But as a territory of the United States, they have the same right to ask for statehood as any previous territory did - as the territory of Minnesota (my state) did in 1858. In 2012, the citizens of Puerto Rico have asked for statehood. I believe that Congress needs to honor that request regardless of the political ramifications.
Something to think about:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903532804576564543481258206.html
(From the above link:)
The Social Security Administration’s inspector general is investigating a case of potentially widespread disability fraud in Puerto Rico, two people familiar with the matter said, part of the agency’s stepped-up efforts to tackle abuses in the financially struggling program.
[SSDI] United Press International
Inspector General Patrick O’Carroll testifying before Congress in July.
The inspector general, Patrick O’Carroll, told an audience at an Aug. 30 disability-examiners conference that the investigation was tied to a pharmaceutical plant that recently closed in Puerto Rico, with 300 employees losing their jobs.
Shortly after the layoff, 290 of the 300 former employees applied for Social Security disability benefits and they all used the same doctor...
I’d prefer they became independent.
It looks like the GOPe is on a path to be every bit as beholden to the Latino lobby as Dems are to blacks.
"In my opinion, Congress has no existence and can exercise no authority outside of the Constitution. Still less is it true that Congress can deal with new territories just as other nations have done or may do with their new territories. This nation is under the control of a written constitution, the supreme law of the land and the only source of the powers which our government, or any branch or officer of it, may exert at any time or at any place. Monarchical and despotic governments, unrestrained by written constitutions, may do with newly acquired territories what this government may not do consistently with our fundamental law. To say otherwise is to concede that Congress may, by action taken outside of the Constitution, engraft upon our republican institutions a colonial system such as exists under monarchical governments. Surely such a result was never contemplated by the fathers of the Constitution. If that instrument had contained a word suggesting the possibility of a result of that character it would never have been adopted by the people of the United States. The idea that this country may acquire territories anywhere upon the earth, by conquest or treaty, and hold them as mere colonies or provinces,—the people inhabiting them to enjoy only such rights as Congress chooses to accord to them,—is wholly inconsistent with the spirit and genius, as well as with the words, of the Constitution." - Justice John Harlan, dissenting in the Insular Cases, 1901
What’s an NBC Latino?