The Wall

Building a wall along the Mexican border is a waste of money, time, and resources.  It would violate the rights of at least one reservation and God only knows how many property owners.  It would disrupt ecosystems for thousands of miles.  While there is definitely a problem with illegal immigration from Mexico, there are better ways to deal with it.

Let's look at why these folks are coming here.  They are poor, hungry, maybe in need of medical care they can't get in Mexico.  In the same situation, would a wall stop you?  Even one as big and ugly as being proposed?  Would you dig a tunnel? Take a plane or boat?  I know they aren't going to build a wall along the Gulf coast.  Too many communities along there depend upon the tourism a wall would kill. Or will they build it a few miles out and only kill wildlife?

The Mexicans are coming for work they know they can get.  We need to start punishing those hiring them.  Get INS workers out in the field (sometimes literally) and jail the ones taking advantage of the desperate.  Why are we punishing them for accepting an opportunity when offered?  For doing the same thing we might, in the same situation?

I'm willing to bet my solution would be a lot less expensive than a wall.  The only rights being violated would be those of criminals and, as far as I can tell, no damage would be done to any ecosystem.  But, ya know, I'm nobody.  Just another freeloader.

Am I Better Off Than Eight Years Ago?

"Are you better off than you were eight years ago?" is the recurring theme on my social media, with the transfer of Presidents happening today.  It's more of that ridiculous thinking that the President has The Power Supreme, that everything that's happened during his term is his doing.  So...  lets look at where I was eight years ago.

I was living with my nephew, his wife, and their toddler son.  I don't remember if I was still working, but if I was it was at McDonald's.  I have an Associate's Degree and I was flipping burgers.  (In the years since getting my degree, I had one job that sort-of fell into the area of Social Work and none that I couldn't have gotten just with my diploma. But I digress.)

I had, besides the ones I lived with, a slew of minions and grandminions.  In the years Obama was in office, those numbers increased.  Pretty sure he wasn't at any of those weddings or conceptions.  I made some new friends, mostly on-line, and developed new interests.  Don't remember Obama introducing me to any of that.  My father died in 2010, but that was cancer, not Obama.  But that's all personal stuff.  Let's look at the financial scene, which is what the question really refers to.

Now I'm on Disability and Welfare.  It's not much, but it's a steady income and I now have a little apartment of my own. My degree is framed on the living room wall.  So in that aspect, am I better off?  Is a steady income "leeched" off the government better than unsteady income from part-time low-wage work while I'm expected to pay back Student Loans?

I think it is.  Vindication is a wonderful thing.  I value the fact that finally, after all these years, someone in authority has recognized my problem.  If someone in authority had done so thirty years ago and given me the help I needed then, maybe I'd be working today.  But Obama did not do that.  The system that did that was in place before Obama was elected.

Obama did good things.  Obama also did bad things.  Everything he did, however, was within the system created centuries ago.  Yeah, it's been fine-tuned since then, but it is basically the same.  I'm better off than I was eight years ago, but Obama didn't do that.  I did that, with the help of the system that was around before Obama took office.