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First they came for the Iranians

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Re: First they came for the Iranians

#151

Post by adrianN »

orbifold wrote: post #55
throwaway2131 wrote: post #27

I am an Iranian CS student. I had a fully funded PhD admission at one of the US universities. I was admitted for the Fall 2016 semester. I am currently in Iran due to my visa not being issued despite the 7 months I have waited for it. I was able to defer my admission to Spring 2017 semester, but then _this_ happened. I am quite sure that I will never be able to attend this program. I had very high hopes for my future…

Try to come to Germany, lots of Iranian expats study and work here. There are a few very good CS programs aswell (TU Munich for example). Most Phd positions come with a salary of ~1700-3400€ a month and there are no significant tuition fees. You might need to do a two year master degree first though, those are usually not funded, but there are no tuition fees either. Courses on the Phd and Masters level are taught in…

Here is a fully funded program: http://gradschool.cs.uni-saarland.de/

You get 800€ during your master and about twice that during your PhD. The institute is really good and there are two Max Planck Institutes (Informatics and Software Systems) right on campus. The program is entirely in English.

Re: First they came for the Iranians

#152

Post by davedx »

grey-area wrote: post #86
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #13

Does the President have the power to unilaterally impose exit-visa requirements?

This is a good question. Obama claimed the president has the power to assassinate american citizens without trial and Trump is claiming further powers over immigration, science and the media. None of these things should be the sole purview of the president, this is why rule via executive orders is so dangerous. It would lead to the end of the republic. The American republic now resembles the late roman one, complete…

Hah. I was thinking this morning that Trump could be the US's Nero.

Re: First they came for the Iranians

#153

Post by jacobush »

andrewclunn wrote: post #22

I can see the point of a broad stroke policy that does not make exceptions, in that it makes enforcement that much easier. Of course whether there's an actual goal here or this is just posturing to make good on the "tough on immigration" campaign talk is anybody's guess.

You make it sound like that goal would be good?

Re: First they came for the Iranians

#154

Post by Grangar »

thowfaraway wrote: post #47

It would be healthier for everyone if there was less speculative outrage. This doesn't affect anyone in the country. It just says if you are trying to get a visa from a country where we think there is a terrorism risk, that country needs to be able to provide screening info on the person, or else we won't provide a visa. It is targeting Syrian refugees, not Iranian PhDs.

Yeah except that you might not be able to re-enter the country if you leave to visit family or something.

Re: First they came for the Iranians

#156

Post by wfunction »

jekdoce wrote: post #11

Advice from a high-level staffer for a Senator: There are two things that everyone concerned should be doing all the time right now, and they're by far the most important things. You should NOT be bothering with online petitions or emailing. 1. The best thing you can do to be heard and get your congressperson to pay attention is to have face-to-face time - if they have town halls, go to them. Go to their local office…

Question: what if your representative already supports what you're saying? Like what if they're already Democrat? What can they even do? The Republicans are the ones who seem to be supporting this. That's what's always stumped me about this advice.

Re: First they came for the Iranians

#157

Post by B1FF_PSUVM »

corndoge wrote: post #85

"Today, we learned that Trump is suspending the issuance of US visas to people from seven majority-Islamic countries, including Iran (but strangely not Saudi Arabia, the cradle of Wahhabist terrorism)." And yet, from the very source linked in the article-- "Details about the forthcoming executive orders are still unconfirmed. But here’s what we can say with high confidence." If you trust AP, then sure, it's likely th…

> adding to the Trump hysteria

Shh, they're having a grand old time with that, don't spoil it.

(They should hand the man some sort of prize for making so many people feel so righteous. I suppose a Nobel is out of consideration ...)

Re: First they came for the Iranians

#158

Post by adventured »

panic wrote: post #149
adventured wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trump very clearly represents the will of an immense number of people and may represent the will of the majority of Americans in fact. For both Clinton and Trump that representation is far beyond those that actually voted. Clinton's camp will be the first to tell you that supposedly a lot of her supporters didn't vote in the election. You say Trump represents straight white males (you imply that's all he represents).…

The only relevant fact here is that millions more people voted against Trump than for him. The top reason people voted for Trump wasn't to support him or his policies, it was that he wasn't Clinton ( http://www.people-press.org/2016/09/21/in-their-own-words-wh... ). His approval rating is below 50% ( http://www.gallup.com/poll/201617/gallup-daily-trump-job-app... ). Trump doesn't represent the majority in any sense o…

OP's premise was in part that only straight white males supported him. The fact is, the majority of white women supported him as well. So OP was wrong on a very, very big part of the premise being floated.

Trump's approval is 57%

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/trum...

The notion that it's useful to pretend Trump represents a tiny group of supporters, for personal emotional comfort over facts, isn't going to be useful in actually trying to counter bad policy. Step one is recognizing that Trump has a very large base that put him into the White House. That he only lost the popular vote by 2.8 million (2.x% of all votes) with California and New York included, is astounding and points to just how large his actual base is. Not to mention the fact that Hillary didn't manage to pull a majority of votes, versus eg Obama's 51.1% in 2012, Obama's 53% in 2008, and Bush's 50.7% in 2004.

Re: First they came for the Iranians

#159

Post by digitalengineer »

dannylandau wrote: post #102
throwaway2131 wrote: post #27

I am an Iranian CS student. I had a fully funded PhD admission at one of the US universities. I was admitted for the Fall 2016 semester. I am currently in Iran due to my visa not being issued despite the 7 months I have waited for it. I was able to defer my admission to Spring 2017 semester, but then _this_ happened. I am quite sure that I will never be able to attend this program. I had very high hopes for my future…

This might sound like a crazy idea, but why not try applying to a few Israeli universities: Tel Aviv University, Weizmann Institute, Hebrew University and Technion are considered to pretty top notch for Computer science and have a few Turing award winners. You'd be surprised that Israeli academics tend to be very welcoming of students from all over the world.

That is not without danger, I believe. Having Israeli stamps in your Iranien passport...

Re: First they came for the Iranians

#160

Post by guildwriter »

panic wrote: post #149
adventured wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trump very clearly represents the will of an immense number of people and may represent the will of the majority of Americans in fact. For both Clinton and Trump that representation is far beyond those that actually voted. Clinton's camp will be the first to tell you that supposedly a lot of her supporters didn't vote in the election. You say Trump represents straight white males (you imply that's all he represents).…

The only relevant fact here is that millions more people voted against Trump than for him. The top reason people voted for Trump wasn't to support him or his policies, it was that he wasn't Clinton ( http://www.people-press.org/2016/09/21/in-their-own-words-wh... ). His approval rating is below 50% ( http://www.gallup.com/poll/201617/gallup-daily-trump-job-app... ). Trump doesn't represent the majority in any sense o…

That's a good way to sweep data like this under the rug:

(Left percent is Clinton, Right percent is Trump)

White men 31% 63%

White women 43 53

White women college graduates 51 45

White women non-college graduates 34 62

White men college graduates 39 54

White men non-college graduates 23 72

(https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/clinton-couldnt-win-ove...)

Like it or not, the fact of the matter is that claiming that only white men supported Trump is incorrect. Going further and trying to dodge the point by claiming that only numbers matter is reductionist and doesn't address the kaleidoscopic issues that a diverse socio-economic-regional population has.

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