Xeifrank's Portal of Knowledge
I have many opinions on the world we live in and in this blog I will strive to put forth many of these opinions and links to stories that support my points of view.
Monday, April 26, 2010
Arizona And Illegal Immigration
I am required to carry my passport/papers with me when travelling/working overseas. If I am in another country illegally I would expect to get detained/arrested and deported. You know, because I have broke the law in that country.
If I want to become a citizen of another country, I will respect and follow the law of that country in attempting to obtain citizenship. I will understand that there may be many different paths, but I will choose one of the legal ones. And if for some reason I choose an illegal one, I will have to pay the consequences if I get caught.
The Federal government of this country has dragged its feet on immigration reform. The status quo is bad, especially for many of the southern border states. The new Arizona law may be extreme but it fills a vacuum left open by the Federal government.
As far as racial profiling goes, you are never going to be able to avoid it completely and it is arguably useful in some situations (ie - catching a criminal based on a eye witness description, or for medical purposes etc...). The overwhelming majority of the citizens of Arizona believe they have an illegal immigration problem, so there is obviously something going on there. I think it is pretty obvious based on demographics and geography that nearly all of the "illegal" immigrants are of a certain race.
The new law does not allow racial profiling to be the "sole" cause for investigating if someone is here "illegally". But of course Hispanics will be singled out due to the demographics. Any concerns about racial profiling of US Citizens of hispanic ancestory should be cooled by the fact that racial profiling probably already exists and there is no evidence to show that the new immigration bill will make things worse. If you have done nothing wrong and are a legal resident, you should have nothing to worry about, other than having to show your drivers license or social security card or some kind of legal proof of citizenship. I carry around my drivers license at all times and would carry around any other form of documentation if it were made public what it needs to be.
The Arizona immigration bill is probably not the correct answer to the "illegal" immigration problem, but given the vacuum in leadership on this issue from the Federal Government, it is a good placeholder until something fair and reasonable is put into place. Personally, I would favor requiring all non resident immigrants (or what is currently known as illegals) to apply for a temporary work permit. They would need to be sponsored by a company that needed to hire them. And after their work permit expired, they would be eligible for one extension and after that would be required to return back to their country of origin for a specific period of time. This policy would be put in place for all low paying jobs as not to interfere with the current H1-Visa program. After five years of crime free working, you can then apply to become a US citizen and go to the back of the line.
America is a great country and it was founded by immigrants, most whom came here legally. Many people world wide, especially those from poor and or third world countries would give almost anything to live here. But obviously we cannot afford to let everyone who wants to work and live here do so. Our standard of living could not support such a thing and the very country that stands so proud and tall now would falter and come crashing down to her knees. This is why our immigration policies need to be tough and we must protect our borders. I would love to save the world and buy a pony for every little boy and girl in the world, but it just is not realistic. Other countries, including Mexico have extremely tough immigration laws and their authorities are extremely harsh on those attempting to immigrate illegally from Central American into Mexico. Why can't we protect our borders with reasonably tough practices?
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Huckagay
Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee nails it when commenting on gay marriage says,
Just because you have your own unique lifestyle does not mean your interests should be accomodated and I agree. You should not be discriminated against but your interests should not necessarily be accomodated.
And if you remember from one of my previous posts, I said that the first condition that needs to be met in order for me to support the legalization of gay marriage was... "I will only support the legalization of gay marriage if it also includes the legalization of polygamy. Yes, polygamy may be "icky" to some people, just as homosexuality is to others. If one group is going to be allowed to marry, then both should be."
Huckabee then drives his point home by saying...
Like minds think alike. Here is the complete transcript of the recent article.
| not every group's interests deserve to be accommodated, if their lifestyle is outside of what he called "the ideal." |
Just because you have your own unique lifestyle does not mean your interests should be accomodated and I agree. You should not be discriminated against but your interests should not necessarily be accomodated.
| "That would be like saying, well there's there are a lot of people who like to use drugs so let's go ahead and accommodate those who want to use drugs. There are some people who believe in incest, so we should accommodate them. There are people who believe in polygamy, should we accommodate them?" |
And if you remember from one of my previous posts, I said that the first condition that needs to be met in order for me to support the legalization of gay marriage was... "I will only support the legalization of gay marriage if it also includes the legalization of polygamy. Yes, polygamy may be "icky" to some people, just as homosexuality is to others. If one group is going to be allowed to marry, then both should be."
Huckabee then drives his point home by saying...
| "Why do you get to choose that two men are OK but one man and three women aren't OK?" he asked |
Like minds think alike. Here is the complete transcript of the recent article.
Thursday, February 04, 2010
Color Me A River
Former POW (Iraq-Gulf War) and hero Soshana Johnson has recently written a book detailing her time in captivity and the mental health problems she has faced since returning to the US (Link to story).
First off, let me say a heart-felt "Thank You!" to Mrs Johnson for her service in defending our country in the US Military. There is no doubt that Mrs Johnson and others serving in the military who have put themselves in harms way, fighting in a difficult war, are heroes. Someone who has gone through the combat trauma that Mrs Johnson went through, should be given as much help as possible dealing with difficult event they went through.
I for one, am very concerned about her mental health, but when Mrs Johnson starts to play the "Race Card" describing how in her mind Jessica Lynch was given more press coverage because she was "a petite, cutesy thing", and that "she felt she was portrayed differently because of her race."
Look, we all feel sorry for you but being a hero or a former POW is not about becoming famous and having adoring fans and tons of media coverage. Yes, that will occasionally happen, but why complain if it doesn't happen to you? You come across as bitter because you did not receive the media attention that Jessica Lynch did. Just be thankful that you and your fellow soldiers that were captured are alive. Going "all in" on the "Race Card" flop makes you come across as disingenuous.
First off, let me say a heart-felt "Thank You!" to Mrs Johnson for her service in defending our country in the US Military. There is no doubt that Mrs Johnson and others serving in the military who have put themselves in harms way, fighting in a difficult war, are heroes. Someone who has gone through the combat trauma that Mrs Johnson went through, should be given as much help as possible dealing with difficult event they went through.
I for one, am very concerned about her mental health, but when Mrs Johnson starts to play the "Race Card" describing how in her mind Jessica Lynch was given more press coverage because she was "a petite, cutesy thing", and that "she felt she was portrayed differently because of her race."
Look, we all feel sorry for you but being a hero or a former POW is not about becoming famous and having adoring fans and tons of media coverage. Yes, that will occasionally happen, but why complain if it doesn't happen to you? You come across as bitter because you did not receive the media attention that Jessica Lynch did. Just be thankful that you and your fellow soldiers that were captured are alive. Going "all in" on the "Race Card" flop makes you come across as disingenuous.
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Kettle Calling The Pot White
It seems like everyone is an expert these days on what city, state or country has the best "quality of life". It is a little difficult for me to wrap my feelings around such claims without questioning the scorecard that is used to judge such things, or even the behind the scenes motive of such polls. Recently, Yahoo News printed a story with results of a study done by the Legatum Group an independent "think tank" group based out of Europe (Great Britain). Their study came up with what they call "The Prosperity Index", a ranked list of countries based on a set of criteria developed by the Legatum Group. Here are the rankings.
The top five countries on this list are all European countries, with the top four out of five all being Nordic countries. Apparently, the Nordics and Europeans in general are the most prosperous and the best places to live. An even closer look at the list shows the top 15 countries on the list being countries that are dominated by caucasians with the primary religion being that of Christianity. These results raise a "red flag" for me. Why is it that the results could be so tilted towards European countries or countries of European influence in their founding? My guess is that the criteria for the rankings are based off of western values and principles, thus skewing the results. So, I took a further look into the criteria.
Here is a list of the criteria used in the Legatum Group study.
These seem to be fairly reasonable categories to measure prosperity, but prosperity only. But studies like these eventually lead to statements like... "Now, let’s hear all the reasons that USA can’t adopt a Scandinavian system, even though those countries have reportedly the best quality of life of any country on the planet." , from The Book Blog, who recently has been supplying me with most of my blog topics. It's a great analytical baseball site, but when it begins venturing into political or societal topics it is no better than the local barber shop talk, and in many cases much worse.
I believe that quality of life, prosperity or whatever you are using as the yardstick to rank a best place to live (city, state or country), is cultural dependent. A group like the Legatum which is based in a western country and that does many studies using western cultural standards as its measuring tool, is almost always going to have skewed results showing countries most similar to their cultural values at the top of the list.
To me, there is "no way" that a global power like China should ever be ranked #75, behind countries like Jamaica, Mongolia, Philippines, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua or Venezuela on any "prosperity" list, that just doesn't pass the "sniff" test. A further look into some of the findings for China and it appears that the Legatum Group did not take the time to finish their homework. Instead of looking at empirical data, like they did with many of the western countries (countries Legatum is more familiar with), they based many of their findings in China off of "expert estimates". I don't even want to take a stab at what an expert estimate is. Having read some of their expert and even non expert findings, I am not too impressed. As an example, one of the areas that China is hammered hard on is the lack of access to the internet. The study quotes the following, "There are only 56 personal computers per 1,000 citizens, indicating that the general populace does not have widespread access." Perhaps if their so called experts had actually stepped foot in China they would see that yes, not too many Chinese people have computers or internet access at home, Internet Cafes are widespread throughout every Chinese city. One does not need to own a computer to have access to the internet.
The USA is hammered in this study for it's health. Not because people are not healthy, not because we don't have good hospitals, doctors, nurses or surgeons, but because our health care system is inefficient. While the USA is hammered for its health care system, European countries are lauded. Kind of a coincidence that this came out at the same time that the US Congress and President are trying to pass legislation on health care reform. This European "think tank" is coming to the roundabout conclusion that if the US were to reform its health care system to look more like the European systems, we'd be a more prosperous country. I am not one who believes that bigger government is the answer to our health care system problems, or any problems that our country may have at all. I believe in just enough regulation to put a lid on as much waste and fraud as possible and then to help out those few who are unable to care for themselves and that's it.
One could easily interpret many of the findings in this study extremely different. For example, which country is it that most people in the world would like to immigrate to? USA. Which country do most foreigners wish to go overseas to study at? USA, UK, France. You rarely hear of an overseas student wishing he or she could go overseas to live or study in Finland. When a very sick and wealthy foreign dignitary looks to find that best medical practitioner where do they most often go to? USA. Which countries have the best math and science test scores? It is usually an Asian country. Where can one find the best museums in the world? Certainly not in Finland or Sweden. I think one would travel to France, Italy, USA, Taiwan, China, India, Greece, Colombia, Peru or UK for that. Where is the category for natural resources, why isn't the military given a higher wait, or influence for being a permanent member of the UN Security Council???
If a study were done by a Japanese or Chinese "think tank", I am sure we would be looking at completely different results. When you base so much of your measurements off of cultural ways of governing, business, health care or education you are going to get very skewed results, which is what this study has come up with. The Legatum Group study is nothing more than entertainment. To be taken more serious, a set of more cultural independent criteria needs to be taken into consideration. I could come up with a similar ranking by taking all of the "light colored skin" western countries, then rank them by which ones are the most ethnically homogeneous. My formula is a lot less complicated, a lot less costly to run, and yet yields nearly the same results. :)
The top five countries on this list are all European countries, with the top four out of five all being Nordic countries. Apparently, the Nordics and Europeans in general are the most prosperous and the best places to live. An even closer look at the list shows the top 15 countries on the list being countries that are dominated by caucasians with the primary religion being that of Christianity. These results raise a "red flag" for me. Why is it that the results could be so tilted towards European countries or countries of European influence in their founding? My guess is that the criteria for the rankings are based off of western values and principles, thus skewing the results. So, I took a further look into the criteria.
Here is a list of the criteria used in the Legatum Group study.
- Economic Fundamentals
- Entrepreneurship and Innovation
- Democratic Institutions
- Education
- Health
- Safety & Security
- Governance
- Personal Freedom
- Social Capital
These seem to be fairly reasonable categories to measure prosperity, but prosperity only. But studies like these eventually lead to statements like... "Now, let’s hear all the reasons that USA can’t adopt a Scandinavian system, even though those countries have reportedly the best quality of life of any country on the planet." , from The Book Blog, who recently has been supplying me with most of my blog topics. It's a great analytical baseball site, but when it begins venturing into political or societal topics it is no better than the local barber shop talk, and in many cases much worse.
I believe that quality of life, prosperity or whatever you are using as the yardstick to rank a best place to live (city, state or country), is cultural dependent. A group like the Legatum which is based in a western country and that does many studies using western cultural standards as its measuring tool, is almost always going to have skewed results showing countries most similar to their cultural values at the top of the list.
To me, there is "no way" that a global power like China should ever be ranked #75, behind countries like Jamaica, Mongolia, Philippines, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua or Venezuela on any "prosperity" list, that just doesn't pass the "sniff" test. A further look into some of the findings for China and it appears that the Legatum Group did not take the time to finish their homework. Instead of looking at empirical data, like they did with many of the western countries (countries Legatum is more familiar with), they based many of their findings in China off of "expert estimates". I don't even want to take a stab at what an expert estimate is. Having read some of their expert and even non expert findings, I am not too impressed. As an example, one of the areas that China is hammered hard on is the lack of access to the internet. The study quotes the following, "There are only 56 personal computers per 1,000 citizens, indicating that the general populace does not have widespread access." Perhaps if their so called experts had actually stepped foot in China they would see that yes, not too many Chinese people have computers or internet access at home, Internet Cafes are widespread throughout every Chinese city. One does not need to own a computer to have access to the internet.
The USA is hammered in this study for it's health. Not because people are not healthy, not because we don't have good hospitals, doctors, nurses or surgeons, but because our health care system is inefficient. While the USA is hammered for its health care system, European countries are lauded. Kind of a coincidence that this came out at the same time that the US Congress and President are trying to pass legislation on health care reform. This European "think tank" is coming to the roundabout conclusion that if the US were to reform its health care system to look more like the European systems, we'd be a more prosperous country. I am not one who believes that bigger government is the answer to our health care system problems, or any problems that our country may have at all. I believe in just enough regulation to put a lid on as much waste and fraud as possible and then to help out those few who are unable to care for themselves and that's it.
One could easily interpret many of the findings in this study extremely different. For example, which country is it that most people in the world would like to immigrate to? USA. Which country do most foreigners wish to go overseas to study at? USA, UK, France. You rarely hear of an overseas student wishing he or she could go overseas to live or study in Finland. When a very sick and wealthy foreign dignitary looks to find that best medical practitioner where do they most often go to? USA. Which countries have the best math and science test scores? It is usually an Asian country. Where can one find the best museums in the world? Certainly not in Finland or Sweden. I think one would travel to France, Italy, USA, Taiwan, China, India, Greece, Colombia, Peru or UK for that. Where is the category for natural resources, why isn't the military given a higher wait, or influence for being a permanent member of the UN Security Council???
If a study were done by a Japanese or Chinese "think tank", I am sure we would be looking at completely different results. When you base so much of your measurements off of cultural ways of governing, business, health care or education you are going to get very skewed results, which is what this study has come up with. The Legatum Group study is nothing more than entertainment. To be taken more serious, a set of more cultural independent criteria needs to be taken into consideration. I could come up with a similar ranking by taking all of the "light colored skin" western countries, then rank them by which ones are the most ethnically homogeneous. My formula is a lot less complicated, a lot less costly to run, and yet yields nearly the same results. :)
Thursday, October 22, 2009
The Gay Marriage Brigade
A lot has been said about whether or not gay marriage should be legalized, especially here in the state of California where we've had a fevered election on the legality of it. I for one am neutral on the idea of gay marriage, but there are a few items that must be satisfied before I'd ever vote for any proposition that allowed gay marriages to be legal. Without further due, they are...
1) I will only support the legalization of gay marriage if it also includes the legalization of polygamy. Yes, polygamy may be "icky" to some people, just as homosexuality is to others. If one group is going to be allowed to marry, then both should be.
2) There must be verbage that public schools are not allowed to discuss or teach homosexuality as a "normal" life-style. To even the field, I would also remove the teaching of heterosexuality in public schools too. These topics should be taught by parents not the school district or the government.
If those two bullet items were satisfied then I could see myself voting in favor of a gay marriage ballot initiative. One other less important, and emotional reason that I didn't vote for the gay marriage initiative is that I did not like the histrionics of the SF mayor Gavin Newsome and the rogue state courts which attempted to legislate from the bench. I believe voting against the gay marriage initiative served as a message to those parties that what they did was unacceptable.
I do not believe that the battle over gay marriage should be lumped into the civil rights or discrimination categories. I don't see gays as being discriminated against in our society. They were never enslaved, nor asked to sit in the back of the bus, or drink from a separate water fountain like African Americans were at one time. Isn't it ironic that the number one demographic voting against legalizing gay marriage in the state of California were African Americans and Latinos, two groups that one would think would be heavily supportive of a group that was being discriminated against. What I believe the gay community and its supporters are really after is to have their life-style considered "normal" within mainstream society. They care more about this and are using the rallying cries of "civil rights" and "discrimination" as a proxy for their attack on mainstream society.
1) I will only support the legalization of gay marriage if it also includes the legalization of polygamy. Yes, polygamy may be "icky" to some people, just as homosexuality is to others. If one group is going to be allowed to marry, then both should be.
2) There must be verbage that public schools are not allowed to discuss or teach homosexuality as a "normal" life-style. To even the field, I would also remove the teaching of heterosexuality in public schools too. These topics should be taught by parents not the school district or the government.
If those two bullet items were satisfied then I could see myself voting in favor of a gay marriage ballot initiative. One other less important, and emotional reason that I didn't vote for the gay marriage initiative is that I did not like the histrionics of the SF mayor Gavin Newsome and the rogue state courts which attempted to legislate from the bench. I believe voting against the gay marriage initiative served as a message to those parties that what they did was unacceptable.
I do not believe that the battle over gay marriage should be lumped into the civil rights or discrimination categories. I don't see gays as being discriminated against in our society. They were never enslaved, nor asked to sit in the back of the bus, or drink from a separate water fountain like African Americans were at one time. Isn't it ironic that the number one demographic voting against legalizing gay marriage in the state of California were African Americans and Latinos, two groups that one would think would be heavily supportive of a group that was being discriminated against. What I believe the gay community and its supporters are really after is to have their life-style considered "normal" within mainstream society. They care more about this and are using the rallying cries of "civil rights" and "discrimination" as a proxy for their attack on mainstream society.
Friday, May 22, 2009
Top 10: Things/People That Annoy Me
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Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Where U Live
How nice of an area you live in is inversley proportional to the number of 7-Elevens in a 5 mile radius of where you live.
A corrolary to this, is that how nice of an area you live in is really inversley proportional to the number of liquor stores in a 2 mile radius of where you live.
A corrolary to this, is that how nice of an area you live in is really inversley proportional to the number of liquor stores in a 2 mile radius of where you live.
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