> I don't want to call radical Islamic terrorism devoted to an international enemy of the US, e.g., ISIS just a religion.

It isn't just a religion, it's a paramilitary group. Exclude them because their part of a paramilitary group, or part of a sect of Islam that carries out illegal actions where a majority participate or support those actions. And if the group is large enough that it's hard to get a good idea on the numbers that support, that's a good clue we aren't identifying the factions well enough.

> Your description of how refugees get vetted on their way into the US conflicts with my (casual) understanding of the process.

My description also provided a reference, a politifact article, which directly linked to the state department's own guidelines.

> Indeed, supposedly we have already admitted refugees from Syria or nearby after less delay than you mention. Besides, there are reports of the refugees bringing TB and, what was it, measles into the US. Good vetting would stop at least TB and likely measles.

References? I can't address a "supposedly" without something more substantive to go on. All to often, headlines about things like those are alarmist on purpose, either by media agencies to drum up attention (and thus money), or from people with a specific agenda who don't look too closely at the details (or worse, purposefully omit relevant information). It happens to both sides, and it's why it's important to really look at the situation, not go off headlines. For example, the results I'm seeing about Syrian refugees and measles are the problem they are creating in the Middle East and Africa, not the US. Perhaps you would be interested to know that 10-15 million people in America are already infected with Latent Tuberculosis[1], which is what the reports of Syrian refugees is referring to.

> I hope you don't believe that that spirit means we necessarily should admit people.

No, but not doing so isn't economically in our best interest. I'm merely stating that if people are allowed in, filtering by religion seems to have real constitutional problems to me.

> pro-Mexican political causes that conflict with some of Trump's campaign positions

If you're talkign about the La Raza group he was a member of, perhaps you'll find this[2] of interest (I'm not a regular reader of Politifact, but it keeps coming up as what looks like a less biased source in my searching). Here's a snippet:

Our search of the Nexis newspaper database found an episode in 2004 when the association wrote a letter calling for the cancellation of a popular Los Angeles reality television show in which illegal immigrants competed for the free services of an immigration lawyer to apply for a green card. The show "functions as a magnet to encourage people to enter this country without documentation," the letter said.

How do you classify a statement that jumps to race as the reason behind actions when the evidence to support it is shaky at best?

> We don't want new ghettos where police are afraid to go. Supposedly there are such in Europe now.

Europe often has a very different view of and attitude towards immigration and refugees. Wall them off, keep them from affecting the country and culture. The US has historically had a very different approach, which is to integrate them as much as possible. There will be some cultural cross contamination, but it's ended up being a very successful, useful, peaceful and economically profitable approach so far. Ghettos happen when a population is repressed and constrained (and that's how it happened here with black ghettos too).

> Of course, we don't want to target all of Islam.

If you aren't planning to target all of Islam, then don't throw around the terms Islam and Muslim without futher qualification as to what type of this larger group you are referring to. Please reread your prior comment's paragraph that begins with "Second, Islam is a long way from being just a religion." How, when you've explained all the problems with Islam as a whole, as you see them, am I supposed to assume you're only referring to things we should do to stop certain groups? This is the problem with the rhetoric. People would be justifiably upset if in a conversation about white supremacists, all of a sudden the discussion shifted to the problems with white people.

> Of course there is the issue of the open border with Mexico: Anyone who can get to Mexico can just walk across the border -- no vetting of any kind.

Whether it's true or not, and I take issue with the characterization of the process and how easy it is, there appear to be less Mexicans immigrating, and less South Americans immigrating as well (which would likely come through the Mexican border). I'm finding it hard to square it being so easy to cross with the industry of people that charge multiple thousands of dollars per person to get them across safely. Why would people pay for something if it was as easy as you make it sound? Also, to clarify, we do not have an open border. It may be policed less in some areas than in others, but it is not open. There are plenty of numbers at the DHS's Yearbook of Immigration Statistics site[4].

> You seem to be for immigration unless there is some really strong reason to say no.

Yes, because there are many benefits. There's only debate whether illegal immigration is more of a draw or a gain, regular immigration is almost always viewed as a net positive from an economic standpoint.

> For Muslims, I'm especially eager to say no if only because their culture is so darned different that they typically are darned slow to assimilate.

Do you have a basis for that belief? It doesn't appear to be true[5]

1: http://www.aafp.org/afp/2009/0515/p879.html

2: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/jun/...

3: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/11/20/what-we-know...

4: https://www.dhs.gov/yearbook-immigration-statistics

5: http://www.factcheck.org/2016/06/trumps-baseless-assimilatio...