Can You Pass The U.S. Citizenship Test?

Word up

there are ESL teaching positions open all around the world. many are being filled by ESL students from other non English speaking countries too.

South Korea has an ESL summer/day camp program with a lot of eastern European employees because they cant get enough natural speakers. its like a Disney world type of environment except everything is done in English. Its supposed to help prevent culture shock when going abroad for students seeking university educations.

I guess, its because it is really hard to get in to collage out there. no space?

thejerrymaden version of the Grateful Dead..........

"Keep 'Crumping'......................just a 'Crumping' along.......!"

Another whole generation ruined by drugs!!!!!!!

tooobular
duuuuuude.
haha.

let me "aksk" you a question "Home Boy"...............TheJerrymadden.

did you even finish high school? or at least a GED?

you aint SNoop Dawg R ya?

"Whats Up?!!! YO!!!!" how'd you afford the "bling"?

Bea-och!!!!!!

What do people living in poverty around the United States have to be greatful for? First, how about the fact that they don't live in poverty in Somalia, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, Yemen, Egypt, Iraq, Cambodia, The Phillipines, Haiti or any of several dozen other Third World Countries in which being poor means having no value as a human being whatsoever.

Here in the U.S, there are at least dozens of programs aimed at helping people obtain life's necessities. They don't always work as well as any of us would like, and they work a lot better if you are not suffering from a mental illness that prevents one from being able to make the basic connections of ideas necessary to know to go, for example, to a public building or church and ask for assistance.

Second, I would submit that in the U.S. more than almost any other country, a willingness to work hard will almost always get you to a better place, albeit slowly. Certainly there are other places that do as well and even a (very) few that do better. But an impoverished, hungry family from Mexico is not very likely to be able to gain access to, for example, Sweden's social support networks.

You pay taxes. Yeah, well, we ALL pay taxes. The tragically ironic thing is that I hear ALL the time on this site and in my discussions with people across the country is how so much is going wrong with this country. We need to do X, and we need to do Y. Well, I hope that it is pretty obvious that if EVERYBODY takes the position that all they need to do is pay their taxes and those things become somebody else's problem, they are not going to be fixed. We can scream bloody murder that with the amount of taxes we pay they SHOULD be fixed...still not going to get it done.

Nobody is going to FORCE anyone to care about where this country goes from a policy perspective. But in the absence of that care, expecting your tax dollars to result in the change you want to see -- or even in PREVENTING change you DON'T want to see is simply not going to happen. The government is going to deposit your tax checks, and the people who DO get involved (and whose agenda may not be particularly attractive to you) are going to decide how those dollars get spent. For the past 8 years, for example a BUSLOAD of them have been spent rebuilding buildings in Iraq that were blown to rubble with bombs that we ALSO paid for with our tax dollars.

But again you're imposing the idea that immigrants want to change our country. They don't; they want to change their lives and the lives of their families. And they achieve that change with a willingness to work hard as you put it. They work hard at jobs many U.S.-born citizens don't want and when they do that, they make this country greater. Isn't that paying back their debt to society? Why do we need to dictate what's important to them, in terms of what they need to know? Immigration reform won't fix the U.S., but it'll patch up a lot of holes.

Nostress,

I have NO idea where you got the notion that I am concerned that immigrants are going to change our country. I have never expressed such a concern because I simply don't HAVE any such concern. I think you have somehow come to the conclusion that I am worried about illegal (or even legal) immigration and want to impose some kind of Draconian conditions on such immigration to make it more difficult for the immigrants. No. Not at all. In fact, I am having a hard time really understanding why my suggestion that citizens (ALL citizens, not just recent immigrants) should know more about the way this country's institutions work strikes you as so horrifyingly imposing. How in the world could a little more knowledge be a BAD thing? I am not saying we should throw anybody out of the country. I support the concept of grandfathering people in as citizens who have already established themselves here, for example. I mean the very IDEA that we are going to spend the time and money to track down and send away 10 million illegal or otherwise undocumented aliens is laughable. The entire STATE in which I live has less than a million people in it, so I can just imagine rounding up the equivalent of 10 states our size.

As to the "conquering" of Mexico, you know as well as I do that this is just a red herring. My bachelor's degree is in American History, and I lived for several years in Tucson. Our land-grab in the Mexican-American War was hardly a conquering of Mexico. If that it what it REALLY was, the U.S. would extend a hell of a lot further south than it does today. We (the U.S) could NEVER have held that territory -- the Mexicans would have gone guerilla and bled us dry. We wanted a chunk of prime real estate, and we took it. But we never "conquered" Mexico or the Mexicans.

My concern is NOT that immigrants should be forced to learn more than the man on the street knows about this country. My concern is that the man on the street is, on average, so lacking in critically important knowledge of his own country that we are in danger of losing the very rights and privileges that make this country so special. The discussion of the Patriot Act, for example, was horrifying to me. I did a radio program in which I denounced the Bush Administration for its back-door demolition of the right to be free from improper search and seizure...especially with regard to the incredible reach of the Act where electronic information like e-mails and web surfing activity were concerned. For every ONE subject they were surveiling, they were capturing extensive records of on-line activity for hundreds of ordinary citizens who had no relation to the specific investigation at hand. I know only too well how opportunistic some law enforcement people can be with information that "accidentally" falls into their hands. But the level of knowledge of the vast majority of callers into the program as to the nature of their own rights was just very dismaying. I don't mean that they should be able to recite the Miranda warnings or anything like that. I mean something as simple as having the right to tell an investigator to go pound sand if he shows up on your doorstep and demands to search your house without first presenting a warrant. A person is certainly always free to consent to such a search if the officer lacks a warrant, but heck one of the primary bases for FOUNDING this country was that we felt it was WRONG that the king could just send his men to invade your home at any time and go through your private life. I just honestly and sincerely think that ordinary people should know this sort of thing off the tops of their heads...'cause you don't have a lot of time to think it over when the sheriff is standing on your front porch...

Seeing as how I was the one arguing immigrants shouldn't have to assimilate to our culture, I'll respond. Are you arguing that Mexico is a conquered land and those who wish to move north must adhere to our culture? I think I'm missing whatever point you were trying to make.

Maybe you do need some level of assimilation, but it can't be so drastic as to require the people who live here to know the Chief Justice's name when I'd bet most of the people you encounter on the streets couldn't tell you.

And if they break the laws, they're criminals, immigrants or not. And yes, this gets into the slippery slope argument that not all illegal immigrants are criminals. I know a lot of people would argue that because they're here illegally they should be automatically deported or incarcerated. But that's the normative perception. From a positive angle, it's fiscally irresponsible to get rid of a workforce that drives this nation's economy in the southwest predominantly but is increasingly spreading all over the nation; this includes agriculture, construction and other labor intensive jobs. We need these people here. We just need to find an easier road to citizenship that gets them paying taxes. How's that for repaying society? I'd personally rather have them sharing the tax burden then learning the constitutional amendments.

1. No, neither the colonists who came to what would eventually become the Eastern United States nor the United States when if finally did become a country 150 years or so later ever conquered Mexico. So we can hardly expect Mexicans to assimilate to our society...until they cross over into the United States.

At that point I think we have a conceptual difference. I may be wrong but you seem to be saying that assimilations means abandoning one's previous culture and wholly adopting a new one. I don't think the definition of "assimilation" goes that far. Certainly when my own great-great grandparents came from Scandinavia they retained quite a number of the cultural traditions from their homeland...and my family continues many of those traditions.

But there HAS to be some degree of assimilation. Example? People in Britain drive on the left side of the road. I am sure after doing so for 20 or 30 years it would be more convenient for them to continue to do if they immigrated to the United States. But it would be a little rough on the rest of us Americans who drive on the right. ...and I am guessing that something on the order of 99.9% of folks from Britain who immigrate here fully expect to voluntarily assimilate to our driving rules.

There are hundreds -- perhaps even thousands of similar examples of conduct that is the norm in other countries that we simply can't allow here. The way some cultures treat women, for example. I could not tolerate some guy from a country where any man is deemed to rule over any woman, walking up to my wife and ordering her around. Not. Gonna. Happen.

But there is no reason why they cannot retain many, many aspects of their native cultures...so long as they do not conflict with ours in a way that creates an illegal or otherwise intolerable situation. I have tremendous sympathy for illegal aliens coming up from Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean, etc.

There is little doubt in my mind that if I felt my wife and children were in danger of starving or being homeless, that I would do whatever I felt I HAD to do to provide for them and keep them safe. I would be a hypocrite indeed if I denied the reality of the same motivations in others simply because I was fortunate enough to have been born here.

On the issue of knowing things like the name of the Chief Justice, I am afraid we part company. First, I could not possibly care less what "most people on the street" know. If that standard is going to become our goal, then we are in SERIOUS trouble as a society. I would like to think we could aim a little higher than that. I mean, is it REALLY that hard to learn the guy's name? Because it really IS important. The Supreme Court makes decisions all the time that significantly affect our day-to-day lives.

I am not suggesting that we all need to send card and letters and e-mails in to the Senate during every confirmation process to try and influence the kinds of justices who are seated. I do that sort of thing simply because I enjoy it and because I worry greatly about how the Court's decisions will affect the lives of my children and (as yet unborn) grandchildren. But I think the issue IS sufficiently important that every American who votes in a Presidential election should think at least briefly before voting about what kind of Justices this President is likely to appoint and what that is likely to mean for the future of our country.

I was quite comfortable with voting for President Obama in that regard...and am quite pleased with his first appointment. I doubt VERY much that I would have felt the same way about McCain's first selection. But if I had not spent at least 10 minutes understanding the make-up of the Court (you really don't need much longer than that to maintain a minimal level of awareness), I could not have even considered such an issue in deciding for whom to cast my vote for President.

We're getting off topic here. We won't go into how the U.S. really did conquer Mexico (or else I wouldn't be living in Arizona). Or how cultural differences such driving on the wrong side of the road was not what anyone has in mind when they talk about illegal immigrants coming here. Or the thing about your wife.

If you couldn't care less what the average person on the street knows, why do you care what the immigrant walking over our border knows? If the people we actually call 'American' don't know it, isn't it hypocritical to force people with NO knowledge of our culture, to learn it? You're creating a double standard here. You're saying these new would-be citizens should research and involve themselves in something they aren't a part of yet. Let them live here, worry-free of ICE invading their homes in ski masks, raise their children so THEY can go to our poorly funded public schools and learn all about the Supreme Court.

ice "cracks" (he he) down on known felons who should not be here in the first place. not the average working class Hero. Ever herd of the Mariel Boat Lift from Cuba (Carter administration)? The world uses passports for a reason. It is not just the US.

unfortunately, i think the problem is with ignorance, and how democracy is only as strong as its populace.

i wish people would stop complaining about how little education they were afforded. Education is free! there is a synonym for it........................its called "learning". it costs if one "needs" to be taught by, anyone other than oneself, who has something better to do with there "free" time.

it takes time and energy to teach (even oneself).

maybe the "Matrix" would be better for some people?

i luv kids ........no need for LSD with them around.

exactly..

Thanks for posting this link. I was always curious what the test actually had in it.

lets enforce the laws the way they exist. that means making employers realize they are going to pay for the labor and then some on top of it. the situation never would have gotten so bad since the 80's (and im not singling out an entire Continent) if the prosecution of law breaking employers were followed through as diligently as "commercial theft" for someone who was steeling to feed their kids, i believe the middle class would be much stronger (less as prison guards anyway). send a message, put some in jail. they are the reason small towns across the county are becoming part of the prison industry. if it had been done along time ago many illegal immigrants would not use the excuse that we really want them here. i definitely do not condone mass deportations on any level, no matter how unprecedented.

i'm tired of it getting worse and my friends' kids suffering the way the Illegal immigrants' children do!!!

yup yup

prejudice............comes in all forms.

who cares who's parents were born "where?". who do "you" represent? which group do "you" identify your self with?

the rest is text book.....(Blah, blah)...........!

America is not the UN. educate yourself instead of waiting for pseudo intellectual "activity hand outs". the problem is economic and not about race. race is just an excuse for morons who cant understand on their own!

watch Fox news, if "you" believe race is the problem with immigration. the issues on "it" are the same here as they are in eastern Europe.

its about literacy!!!!!!!!

you probably didnt pass the test didnt you

tisk tisk

double negative?

dude................. did you go to collage?

You're right. Let's get rid of the illegal immigrants taking up all those nice white people jobs. I'd love to see the auto-worker in Michigan who just lost his job at GM, after working there for 15 years to move down here to Arizona to mow public lawns in the one hundred degree heat.

I'm sure some already are.

prejudice............comes in all forms.

who cares who's parents were born "where?". who do "you" represent? which group do "you" identify your self with?

the rest is text book.....(Blah, blah)...........!

America is not the UN. educate yourself instead of waiting for pseudo intellectual "activity hand outs". the problem is economic and not about race. race is just an excuse for morons who cant understand on their own!

watch Fox news, if "you" believe race is the problem with immigration. the issues on "it", are the same here as they are in eastern Europe.

its about literacy!!!!!!!!

"we didnt cross the border;
the border crossed us"

That is a fact my friend an absolute fact!

HUH?

Lol, I didn't realize my response was so confusing, but I guess I was just talking randomly. What I'm saying is that because of an incompetent teacher, my classmates and I missed out on really learning about the American government system. Who's to say that this isn't happening in more schools around the country? Maybe inadequate teaching has to do with the fact that a lot of Americans wouldn't do so well on the citizenship test.

yup yup.

+ US history has been diluted & re-written so much that it no longer makes any fucking sense, so the individuals who do attempt at learning it are bombarded with contradicting jargon & hypocritical bullshit..

Good for you for taking the initiative and learning on your own. What a shame about the teacher you had who didn't teach.

not arguing about the test being
too hard...

showing people what the test is.

'i would increase the fines to employers of illegal immigrants to the point that it would bankrupt the company who employs them (upwards of a million per illegal).'

You said that. You just put the entire states of Arizona, New Mexico and Texas into a bankrupt hole.

Well said

I don't know if the prevailing theories have changed since I was an undergraduate (I am not saying that was a long time ago, I am merely saying that the carbon from the Boston fern in my dorm room has now been in the ground long enough to have become a fossil fuel...), but at that time we were being taught that even the Indians/Native Americans migrated to North America via a land bridge to what is now Alaska some 40,000 years ago (I wasn't even a Freshman by then)...