MOTheRManGay

Tag: news

  • When will politicians finally adopt a MOTheR approach to solving the immigration issue?

    I’m first generation American from parents who immigrated here in the 1950s from England. They came here for a better life, and it was much easier for them as they were white and spoke English. They immigrated legally and became naturalized citizens about 8-10 years after they arrived, just after I was born. I will be forever grateful they made that choice as I think my opportunities in the US have been greater than they would have been for me in England.

    I’ve lived within an hour’s drive of Los Angeles for most of my life. Especially in California, but frankly throughout the United States, our economy only operates at its most productive level with a significant amount of immigrant labor. Many immigrant laborers snuck into the country rather than go through the legal process, and this has gone on for decades. Most of these immigrants just want to work and make a better life for their families back in their home countries. They are motivated, work long hours, and mostly perform jobs that no Americans will do. And I know this from experience, having worked alongside individuals here illegally when I was younger. However, there is a small minority of other immigrants here illegally who are awful people, and who have and will continue to commit violent crimes. They should be immediately captured and deported. And the majority of Americans agree that we don’t want violent criminals from other country here in our nation.

    We need to approach the illegal immigration issue with the idea that there are multiple but simple steps to resolve most of the problem areas. To quote an old expression, this is not rocket science. In fact it’s not that complicated to fix most of the situation.

    First, we need to secure our borders. Maybe other countries can have open borders, but it isn’t working for us. There are ways to do this electronically rather than building huge walls, but regardless, we need to know who’s coming into our country. Anyone entering our country illegally needs to be sent back. If Canada or Mexico doesn’t enforce closing their borders or coastline, then that is a problem they need to fix. We should send anyone entering the country from either of these two countries directly back to them.

    Second, after securing our borders, we need to screen everyone wanting to cross into the US before they are allowed in. Those who are likely to commit criminal activities should be denied entrance. (As a point of reference, individuals with just a DUI in the US are often denied entry to Canada.) I understand that we need to do something with the influx of individuals who are already in the US illegally, and we should allow them to go through that screening process while they are here in the US for those with no criminal history.

    Third, we need realistically-sized Immigration and Guest Worker programs. There are plenty of jobs for immigrants and guest workers. We need to allow entry to enough immigrants and guest workers each year to fill those jobs. Yes, there are some immigrants who come here to work professional jobs, but most come here to perform hourly labor-type functions. Historically, the number of guest workers allowed into the US has not generally been enough to meet the demands from our economy. We need to set the level high enough to meet the demand, and adjust the numbers based upon seasonal needs. This three effort needs to be performed in conjunction with each other. And it really needs to be developed now. I’ve heard about enforcement, but where is the discussion of resolving our need for a reasonable number of immigrant workers.

    Fourth,,…. Well there isn’t really any fourth step. The solution to most of the issue is that simple.

    Frankly, I don’t think this is an issue that the electeds or lobbyists want to resolve as they’ve had decades to develop and evolve a workable solution and haven’t. Lobbyists make a ton of money off this issue and if it’s solved, they are all out of jobs. Entire lobbying firms are based upon this sole issue! (And being a Lobbyist is often the post-office career path for former elected officials!) Electeds or those running against them strongly campaign on this issue. In fact, I got two donation requests right after the ICE activities in Los Angeles started in June 2025.

    One elected representative from my area called the actions by Trump over the last month, “political theater.” He’s right, but it has been political theater from both parties for decades. If you don’t think Biden was also creating political theater by essentially opening our borders with no controls then you’re delusional. And Sanctuary Cities created by local and state politicians are just as ridiculous if these cities or states think protecting illegals who are former rapists, murderers, and drug dealers helps our society. But I have yet to hear of a sanctuary city that has formally taken a position against those here illegally who commit heinous crimes. Polls show that the vast majority of Americans what these violent criminals immediately locked up and turned over to ICE.

    You’ll notice I didn’t use the term “undocumented immigrant.” No matter what lobbyists or anyone else wants to call them, these individuals both entered the US and stay here illegally. As previously mentioned, I have a criminal background from pleading to a white collar crime. I will forever be branded a criminal with the reduced freedom and conditions that come with that. And those who commit the act of illegally entering and staying in the US have also committed a criminal act, regardless of what anyone calls it. I understand the US contributed to the situation through lax border security, allowing these illegal aliens to be hired by numerous US individuals and business that use them to reduce costs or increase profits, and that they perform backbreaking work that no one else would. Again, we need to fix the problem rather than all this politicking and lobbying for political correctness. I believe an argument can actually be made that sugarcoating the term delays a resolution that would benefit immigrants and guest workers over the long run. Right now there are essentially no rights or protections if someone here illegally is the victim or a crime, or is abused by their employers.

    We need to solve this issue that has been around for longer than the entire 65 years I have been alive with a solution that isn’t one extreme or another. The Middle of the Road solution, is better than driving off the edge of road like we have been! Of course there are experts who will immediately tell us that a MOTheR solution won’t work. And of course this resolution would solve every single situation, but it would resolve most of them. But I get tired of not listening to a common sense approach which allows us to work towards systems and solutions that are better than we have now, even if they are not perfect.

  • Where’s the MOTheR media, meaning unbiased reporting?

    It”s gotten to the point where I basically believe nothing that’s being reported in the media because it all seems more like editorials for their conservative or liberal agendas.

    I mentioned in my first post that I was sent to prison – it was a prison camp and I was there for 32 months. I’ll do posts in the future that explain why and my thoughts on the United State’s justice system. Anyway, while I was in camp, experiencing the excessive boredom it entailed, I would often go into the TV room early in the mornings. At that time, just a few of us were in there, usually watching CNN, MSNBC and FOX as there were several TVs in the room. (You listened through your own little radio you purchased from the commissary.) How entertaining it was for me to realize that we must be living in three entirely different countries as these “news” channels would report the same incident with entirely different background facts, biases and summaries! It was preposterous that any of these three channels (and others) honestly reported the “news,” despite that word being in each of their names.

    The same situation exists with newspapers that also believe their stories report the news, but like the broadcast media, they actually present editorial content more than the facts. And presenting just some of the facts is also not accurate; all relevant facts that can be uncovered need to be presented rather than just the ones that support the newspaper’s agenda. Not for one minute can a broadcast news station or newspaper convince me that they don’t have a political agenda. I long for the time years ago when we were better able to use the facts reported in the media to make our own opinions. Instead we have the current situation where we have to obtain competing and often opposing factual data by sifting through all the biased information presented by these so-called news sources. And then hope we can make an accurate decision because we have the relevant facts to do so.

    I used to have to deal with the media a lot during my career. What I learned was that reporters start with their own position or opinion before they even begin an interview. Their goal is to get a quote that supports the position they have, rather than try to find out if there are opposing facts. Sadly, their real goal seemed to be to draw the most attention to their story whether accurate or not. They would sometimes later present a retraction if information was wrong, but in small print, days later, on a page where it wouldn’t get noticed.

    One Editor-in-Chief told me that in the days when newspapers were only in print, the most salacious stories were listed “above the fold” where they could be seen by purchasers on the old newspaper stands and thus maximize sales. Over time I came to learn the reality that I naively didn’t realize when I was younger. Media organizations are first operated to make a profit, then to report the news. Even the employees sometimes try to justify that this priority is reversed, but it is not. And the bigger profit they make, the more money everyone who works there makes. And the more salacious their news, or the more it reflects that of their viewers/readers, the more money the organization makes. This has been going on for decades, and one can look back almost a century to see how Hearst put forth his opinions as facts. However, it seems to me to have become a lot more extreme with the advent of the internet and “instant news” programs.

    Politicians and their staff are often the source of this extreme information. But it’s up to the media to test these political messages and present reality, rather than trying to support or protest the political message in order to support their own organizations’ profit-driven agendas. When presented, opposing information is often inaccurate, or it’s omitted, or buried beneath layers of other data. As a specific example, I remember several years ago trying to find out the death rates of different age brackets from covid on the CDC website. As a senior citizen, I was interested in this. I remember having to sift through multiple pages of data to get that very basic information because it didn’t fit the overall political message at that time from the political communications staff. Some of the media lauded that process while others skewered it. I’m not trying to single out one political party here as there are examples from Democrat and Republican politicians that can be utilized to support my thoughts. So please don’t get all preachy to me about how you viewed specific leadership during the covid pandemic.

    I want news channels to start reporting facts. I am not a member of any political party so I don’t have a horse in this media race except for wanting to hear the truth. I have tried to locate a few media sources that I feel are relatively unbiased, or that will at least state the specific perspective of the presenter before the story starts. But I want information to come to me without bias – kind of a “middle of the road” by presentation of the facts, rather than the extremes of bending the truth for your own good. Truth usually doesn’t exist in the extreme, it exists in a realm of competing information that affects its reality. And that’s where the real story lies, presenting ALL the facts, stating them clearly without bias, and letting the public use them to form their own educated opinions. If the public wants your editorial opinion then state it as such, rather than presenting opinion as reality. I’m tired of living in the extreme where I’m being told I live in a time where everything is better than it has ever been, or that we are about to lose democracy and live under a military dictatorship. Neither is true, but I sometimes wonder what the real situation is. And the media is almost useless in helping me find that reality.