Posted on 10/24/2014 8:02:46 PM PDT by Ebenezer
(English-language translation)
San Juan - A group of residents of Vieques, which was used by the United States Navy for six decades, plans to convene a referendum to propose its independence from Puerto Rico, of which it is a municipality.
"We don't need the government of Puerto Rico. What we want is our own constitution and government under the United States Constitution," said today Yashei Rosario, who is proposing this initiative along with her husband Julián García.
Rosario and those who second this idea complain that the Puerto Rican authorities "have not promoted the economic development of Vieques" since the American Navy withdrew from the island in 2003 after years of protests and acts of civil disobedience.
In 2010, she and her husband created the Vieques Sustainable Socioeconomic Development Corporation with the goal of invigorating the local economy independently without waiting for related initiatives from the government of Puerto Rico.
However, they did not receive financial support from the government of Puerto Rico for their activities.
"We saw ourselves cornered and with limitations, and we decided that what was best was to separate from the government of Puerto Rico and have our own government just as Guam, the Virgin Islands, and other territories of the United States have," the 20-year Vieques resident said.
Rosario and García began to collect signatures from Vieques citizens to establish a political party and, through it, organize a consultation between the residents of the island on whether they wish to become independent from Puerto Rico which, in turn, is a United States Commonwealth.
In the opinion of Vieques community leader Ismael Guadalupe, this proposal actually seeks independence so as to bring back the United States Navy, which for decades was the economic engine of this little island which is located close to one hour from the northeast corner of Puerto Rico.
"I'm against the idea because it's a strategy to have the Navy return to Vieques," this retired teacher, who in his day was one of the leaders of the popular revolt that provoked the withdrawal of the American forces, told EFE.
However, Rosario insists that her intention is not for the return of the Navy - which still owns 54% of the land in Vieques - and that they are only trying to have a capacity for more self-management.
Vieques is an island with [an area of] 52 square miles (135 square kilometers), 21 miles (34 kilometers) long and 4 miles (6 kilometers) wide.
The tourism it gets is relatively reduced, although constant almost the entire year, due to its tropical climate. Since 1941, it was used by the American Army to hold military exercises and test bombs, missiles, and other weapons there.
In the wake of a series of popular protests, the American Army abandoned the military base but did not undertake the subsequent tasks of cleaning and removing explosives, for which pollution problems still persist.
Organizations of all social stripes in Puerto Rico have insisted for years that the withdrawal of the Navy from Vieques, still under Washington's control through the federal Fish and Wildlife Service, did not mean the end of the problems for its inhabitants, who have also found themselves without one of their main sources of income.
They maintain that diseases such as cancer, diabetes, hypertension, and respiratory problems are much more common among the residents of Vieques than in other parts of Puerto Rico, which they attribute to the military exercises, which the Navy denies claiming the lack of objective studies.
Huh? Are you confusing the Philippines with Muslim-infested Indonesia or something? The Philippines are OVERWHELMINGLY Roman Catholic (more so than any existing American state) and the Muslims population is a small minority in single digits (around 5% of the population according to the last census). Methodists are 6% of the population of Illinois. So do we have a large influx of "Methodist Congressmen" in America thanks to Illinois having 18 seats in Congress, and a big "Methodist influence" in our state? Hardly.
My observation with Filipino-Americans, anyway, is all the ones I've met are pretty strongly pro-life Catholics and heavily lean Republican. Of course, the population living in the U.S. can't be identical to their equivalents on the island, but I wouldn't be surprised if Filipino-Americans were the most GOP friendly voting bloc of all Asian-Americans.
That being said, I'd absolutely oppose "statehood for the Philippines" for other reasons. For starters, they ceased being a US territory and severed ties with us decades ago. Secondly, as you noted, we'd have to absorb a huge, low income island population and that would be a terrible drain on the American economy. And the most obvious reason I'm against it -- I think its sheer insanity to some faraway island nation that has little in common the culture of the US mainland to become a state. It was a terrible idea when they did it for Hawaii, and it would be terrible for the Philippines.
There gets to a point with an empire (and frankly, one could call the U.S. that) where it overreaches itself in size and becomes too unwieldy or unmanageable (and especially when you have such grave differences in the population of notions of governance and culture).
I think, with over 319 million, we’ve gone past that point. When I was born, the population of the U.S. was 214 million (40 years ago). When my father was born (in 1939), it was 132 million. These are staggering figures.
The Philippines just surpassed 100 million in July. To even ponder ADDING that many people in one shot, a sovereign republic as they are, is unimaginable. Having that many people, thousands of miles away, decide on the course of our republic. Ditto their having their affairs decided by us by an equally long distance.
If anything, I think the United States needs to consider dividing itself. Let those areas that believe in their notions of big government, ultraleft cultural/social issues and other PC-isms be free to do their worst. Same for those areas that wish to adhere to our Founders’ vision and its Constitutional parameters. A shotgun marriage does not bode well for either side, and eventually will lead to another war. Bringing the Philippines into the equation, or Puerto Rico, for that matter (as a state), just brings us closer to that boiling point.
5% (a minimum estimate, could be twice as much) of 100 million people is 5 million people, and they, unlike Methodists in Illinois, are concentrated in muzzie areas so they would get their own Congressional seats. Also unlike Methodists in Illinois, being Muslim is part of their political identity, and a large number of them are terrorist friendly.
Hawaiian statehood would have been fine, if not for the labor union coup in 1954. Oh what a paradise a GOP Hawaii would be.
Alaska also looked like a labor democrat disaster, but they wised up. Indeed if I’m not mistaken it was believed that of the 2, Alaska would be the more democrat state.
Good point though the irony of admitting Hawaii and Alaska. It was a "bipartisan" deal precisely because they assumed Hawaii would become a Republican state and Alaska would become a RAT one. Oops!
I've seen no similar attempts to create a level playing field in modern times. That idiotic DC statehood bill from 2010 had a clause to give Utah a fourth congressional seat, but Republicans rightfully knew it was pointless since Utah would automatically gain one after the next remap anyway. And it would take a miracle for DC to ever vote Republican. I still maintain that Puerto Rican statehood would heavily benefit the RATs (I'm guessing they'd get about 6 or 7 congressional seats, and all but 1 or 2 of them would elect RATs... all you need to do is look at their local voting patterns. Republicans win occasionally in PR, but most of them are RINOs anyway). Is there any serious statehood proposal that would benefit the GOP by creating a new safe Republican state? I doubt it.
Of course Alaska’s current congressional delegation of
Princess Lisa, Liberal RINO
Prince Begich Jr., Liberal rat
And Don “Not so” Young, corrupt RINO Dinosaur
leaves a lot to be desired. At least they have a terrific conservative Governor named Sean Parnell. Hopefully he’s reelected and Begich is turned out.
As the son of a person (Pedro Guadalupe Guadalupe, not a mis-print on the name) who IN FACT SOLD THEIR (Mother & Brothers etc.,) FARM (located in Vieques ) TO THE U.S. GOVERNMENT for the Navy to use.
My father told me if I ever get to Vieques, Puerto Rico, I would not need a hotel / motel room, because I have so many relatives.
Maybe because quite possibly, your the product of Outcome Based Education. What is Outcome Based Education? Outcome Based Education is Example: Teacher asks little Johnny, how much is 2 (two) plus 2 (two)? Little Johnny answer’s 27, the Teacher just say’s your SELF ESTEEM is just so infectious.
Puerto Rico & Vieques in short is the result of the spoils of War.
If you have to ask what War??? The answer is The Spanish American War (1898-1901). See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish%E2%80%93American_War
For other’s reading this you may also want to read the above wikipedia, reference : 2nd Paragraph, second sentence: ‘ American public opinion was agitated by anti-Spanish propaganda led by journalists such as Joseph Pulitzer and William Hearst which used yellow journalism to criticize Spanish administration of Cuba.’
Hence, now you really know just what the "Pulitzer Prize" is for. Answer Yellow Journalism. In case the readers didn't know, these guy's (Pulitzer & Hearst) wrote the book on Yellow Journalism.
P.S.
Their's probably a better then 50-50 chance that “Vieques community leader Ismael Guadalupe,” is some how related to me. I won’t be surprised.
No one knows for sure whether Puerto Rico would be a Democrat or Republican state. Voters in PR are members of either the pro-statehood New Progressive Party (the name has nothing to do with the modern use of the word in U.S. politics; it was chosen by lifelong Republican Gov. Luis A. Ferrer to denote economic progress) or the pro-”commonwealth” Popular Democratic Party. A liberal that is pro-statehood will join and vote for the NPP; a conservative that is pro-statehood will join and vote for the NPP; liberal that is anti-statehood will join and vote for the PDP; and a conservative that is anti-statehood will join and vote for the PDP. Relatively few people know what Republicans and Democrats stand for, and if PR became a state and people had to side with one of the national parties it would be a very fluid process, and we don’t know how many of Puerto Rico’s two senators and five representatives would be Democrat or Republican, either in the short or long term.
While virtually no PDP leaders are members of the national GOP, this is for historical, not ideological, reasons (the main statehood party prior to 1968 was affiliated with the GOP and had “Republican” in its name; PDP founder Luis Muñoz Marín was an ally of FDR and JFK, etc.), and many Populares do not beling to either national party; most NPP leaders are members of the GOP, although many prominent ones are Democrats (part of the NPP’s strategy to achieve statehood is to have a seat in the table at both national parties), and prior to the 2012 elections (in which NPP/GOP Mayor Jorge Santini was upset in San Juan), 6 of the 8 largest cities had Republican mayors (now it’s 5 out of 8).
The typical Puerto Rico voter is socially conservative (pro-life, pro-marriage), economically populist (protectionist, wary of big business), pro-military, and more tolerant of corruption or personal foibles than your average bear; they also have no interest in amnesty for illegal aliens, and don’t have a very high opinion of the illegal aliens from the Dominican Republic that have been arriving in PR over the past 30 years. The most similar state electorate statewide would be Louisiana’s, particularly prior to the Obama years; LA voted for Nixon in 72, Carter in 76, Reagan in 80 and 84, Bush in 88, Clinton in 92 and 96, and Bush in 2000 and 2004, and PR likely would have voted pretty much the same way as LA (except that Gore likely would have beaten Bush). The biggest difference between LA and PR is the lack of racial polarization in PR, where blacks don’t vote as a block (in fact, the president of the PR Republican party is the black mayor of Aguadilla). Puerto Ricans that have moved to Central Florida over the past 25 years pretty much have been swing voters, voting for Gore and Nelson in 2000, Jen in 2002, W and Mel in 2004, Crist and Nelson in 2006, Obama in 2008, Rubio in 2010 and Obama and Nelson in 2012; one needs to keep in mind that about 1/3 of Puerto Ricans in Central FL didn’t move there from PR, but are second- or third-generation “Newyorricans” from urban areas in NY, NJ, CT, MA or IL (and those vote heavily Democrat).
So if anyone tells you that he knows how Puerto Rico will vote a decade or two after it becomes a state, take it with a huge pillar of salt. Ultimately, of course, the decision whether to make Puerto Rico a state should rest not on political calculations, but on basic fairness. Puerto Rico’s 3.6 million U.S. citizens should have the right to elect the members of Congress that legislate over them and for the president who can send them to war.
The (seemingly impossible to predict) percentage of PDP supporters that would be Republicans seems to be the key to the whole thing.
I wish Puerto Rico had a Presidential preference poll or something, that would be useful data.
Yeah, the percentage of PDP members who wiuld vote Republican if PR was a state could be 20% or 80% or any bumber in between; one would think that the historical ties with the Democrat Party would disappear soon, and that voters who want more local autonomy and lower federal taxes would be more at home in the GOP, but it would be a fool’s errand to make a prediction. We know how well those predictions turned out in 1959 (when AK and HI were admitted pretty much in tandem, since AK surely was going to be a Democrat state so it was only fair that obviously Republican HI be admitted as well).
But we don’t know how many NPP members would be Republican, either (and preference polls won’t help, since they don’t vote for persons running as Democrats or Republicans, except every four years in the presidential primaries).
You don’t think a POTUS referendum would be useful? Could the results be that far off from what they would be in a real election?
However, you do make a valid point that Puerto Rico is a wildcare as far as how they'd vote if they attained statedhood, and Congress got in completely backwards in predicting Hawaii would be a GOP state and Alaska would be a RAT one.
I think we can safely predict DC would be solid RAT if it ever attained statehood, however. A RINO managed to win one seat on the DC city council a few years back, but I'm not impressed. They're so far left in their Presidential voting patterns, they make Massachuttes look moderate.
A referendum on a subject that people are ignorant about and don’t believe would have any effect even if they fead up on it would not be very instructive.
DC has always had elections ipitting RATs abd Republicans, and, of course, they’ve been voting iverwhelmingly RAT for POTUS since 1964, so there’s no doubt how residents of DC would vote were it a state. You know my position on DC: create a state of New Columbia that includes not just DC but also Montco, PG County and Charles County in MD and Arlington and Fairfax Counties and Alexandria, Falls Church and Fairfax cities in VA, thereby making VA Republican again and turning MD into a swing state.
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