AlternateRoute

Not than anyone in their right mind would want to, but it may shortly be harder to become a US citizen if a new citizenship exam is introduced. The people wishing to apply for citizenship would have to pass this test before becoming a citizen.
However, one has to wonder what the point of such a test is. Is it merely to ensure that new citizens know how the country works? Fair enough, however many of the questions would not even be able to be answered by people who had been born in the US.
For example,

• What is the rule of law?
• How many justices are on the Supreme Court?
• What did Susan B. Anthony do?

Perhaps the test is meant to weed out would-be terrorists or traitors, by analysing their answers.

For example:

Question: What do the 13 stripes on the US flag represent?

Correct Answer: The original 13 colonies

Terrorist Answer: The red and white stripes depict the blood soaked desert sand of the Middle East resulting from US imperialist aggression.

Question: What do the 50 stars on the US flag represent?

Correct Answer: There is one star for each state of the United States.

Terrorist Answer: The stars represent the bursting shells of the shock and awe attacks that have characterised the militaristic expansion of the United States from the original 13 colonies.

But of course, all of the questions on the test show the USA in a good light, as you would expect, but this ignores a vast part of the history of the USA.

Here are some other questions they should include in the test.

Question: The eighth Amendment to the Constitution prohibits “cruel and unusual punishment”. Is punishment allowed if it is cruel but not unusual or unusual but not cruel?

Answer: Yes

Question: Abraham Lincoln supported the abolition of slavery. Was it his intention that blacks should become citizens and be given the same rights in law as whites?

Answer: No

Question: Which of the following countries has not been subject to military intervention by the United States. Canada, Mexico, Haiti, Hawai’i, Nicaragua, China, Korea, Panama, Philippines, Guam, Hondurras, Domincan Republic, Cuba, Mexico, Russia, Yugoslavia, Turkey, El Salavador, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Libya, Grenada, Sudan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq.

Answer: None

Question: Which is the only country to have used nuclear weapons in war?

Answer: USA

Question: Which of the following international treaties have been fully ratified and implemented by the United States? The Kyoto Protocol; The Convention of the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women; The Convention of the Rights of the Child, The Convention on the Prohibition, Use, Stockpiling, and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines; The International Criminal Court; International Labor Organisation Conventions; International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

Answer: None

Makes you wonder why people are lining up to get into such a country.

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 4th, 2007 at 1026 and is filed under Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.