Ashley Bell and Donald Trump

An open letter to Ashley Bell,

Mr. Bell,

I hope your family and friends are doing well. With so much danger in our country today from Mother Nature, I still had a moment to think of you working for Donald Trump.

You are still whoring yourself to the Donald this evening? Right? I've heard nothing about your resignation.

So break it down for your 'brothers and sisters' as you have called them so many times.

Trump is the right man ...

Racism in Georgia, Stats borrowed from the Boston Globe

First, some credit to the Boston Globe for presenting Norcross, Georgia in the proper light which is not so white anymore. Only the Irish can relate to being white and a second class minority, eh?

One little fact really needs to be examined in terms of racism, second class citizens, and perceptions. I'll quote the whole paragraph.

Four counties in Georgia signed up for a program that allows local police and sheriffs to check the immigration status of any person charged with a crime, including Gwinnett County, where Norcross is located. Those four places deported more than 1,300 illegal immigrants using the program in the last year, according to federal statistics.

Doesn't mean very much with a first reading, buried in all the other angst of being old, white, and Southern.

So four counties in Georgia, one of them Gwinnett with a population of 1,000,000, deported 1,300 illegal immigrants last year.

I know the names of the 3 other counties, their demographics, or population. My population estimate for Gwinnett, based on the 2010 Census of 859,000, of 1 million might be too low after 6 years. Another county, Cobb had a population of 717,000 in 2010. Whitfield adds 102,000. And, my current county of residence, Hall, had a population of 187,000 back in 2010. So maybe the 4 counties have a total population of 2 million.

Only 1,300 illegals were rounded up and deported out of those 2 million last year. That's 0.00065% of the population.

Again, the police could only find 0.00065% of the entire populations of four counties living, well, in sin, if being undocumented is a sin in the South.

So what the frack does it cost? Homeland Security spent $64,000,000 ($64 million) in 2010 to collect all the 287g prisoners. Only Trump knows what Homeland spent last year for 287g. I'm estimating $150,000,000 ($150 million) as spending increased over 26% in each year of the program. Actually 300% in the first two years. None of their spending goes directly to counties like Gwinnett or Hall.

It's been estimated that it costs a jurisdiction a million dollars a year to run a 287g program. " Mecklenburg County, NC, spent an estimated $5.3 million to set up and operate the 287(g) program in its first year." That information comes from theMigration Policy Institute. Their data came from Homeland Security and local jurisdictions like county sheriffs.

I didn't make up any of those numbers.

So I'm ringing up some of the numbers:

4 Georgia counties spending a cool million each equals $4 million in local spending
Homeland Security spending $150 million a year to run 70 programs equals $2 million each program

So, 4 local Georgia jurisdictions get over $8 million in support from the Feds and spend $4 million of local property taxes to collect 1,400 illegals. So, $12 million divided by 1,400 or is it 1,400 divided by $12 million means about $9,000 per illegal. Not too bad? Great program.

Only, not so much. All 1,400 illegals were already in jail.

Colin won't stand for it any more.

I should write a nice letter to the editor on this subject. It offends everyone and no one all at the same time which makes it perfect material for the backwoods dog beater.

Colin Kaepernick picked a fight and did a great job of it. 'My hat's off to him.' He picked a losing battle and stood on Sun Tzu's 'Dying Ground' when he sat down for his country's national anthem.

Was it an act of Civil Disobedience? No. For that to work, he'd have to face legal consequences for breaking the unfair and unjust law forcing people to stand during the national anthem at football games.

No such law; therefore, no way to break it.

He did violate social convention in the nearly sacred Red Neck Church of Pigskin. Now that takes some guts.

It takes something like he did to focus attention on social issues. We do have bodies laying in the streets. We have locked up kids as felons for smoking pot. We sell kids into private prisons. Yet, we have given Wall Street the keys to our national economy car and paved them a four lane road to Hell and Back.

So cut this man some slack. He's got some skin in the capitalist game. He's close enough to having it made to have real credibility. He's risking that. He's daring people, on one issue, to call him out as being wrong on that issue.

He's winning that dare even as he's losing public indifference, professional associations, and maybe his paycheck.

Who does that without good reason.

Muhammad Ali

I won't get tired of hearing his story in the media.

Reparations and collectives

I feel confused about the concept of racism. Many have clear ideas on racism. Maybe I take too broad of a meaning when engaging some in internet comments.

Racism does have many meanings but only mine matters! I never said that but I hear it in myself and in others.

So, the Anti-Defamation League offers this definition:

Racism is the belief that a particular race is superior or inferior to another, that a person’s social and moral traits are predetermined by his or her inborn biological characteristics. Racial separatism is the belief, most of the time based on racism, that different races should remain segregated and apart from one another.

Kind of narrows it down some. Do you ever hear this version?

Racism was slavery.

No. I thought not and I feel good that you haven't heard that one. Racism isn't over even if slavery is less visible around the world. Or, to Americanize the discussion, even if American, Southern, plantation, Pre-Civil War, slavery disappeared more than 100 years ago.

Weeks ago, I heard about a 'collective.' As in, "I want my collective to rise up and dominate all others."

I let that slide past me knowing I couldn't know what the speaker meant.

IF, and that's a big if as usual, if the collective's membership excludes or includes based on race,...

Maybe I felt no need to ask. Maybe I assumed the Black speaker meant 'my race' over any other race. Maybe I waited to learn more since I miss some nuance in discussions.

I got some clarity today as the discussion had recently turned to reparations much to the surprise of many. I said reparations and the discussion of reparation harmed the speakers point of view. That 'reparations' is a word which triggers spin. As in, the Black race is sitting around waiting for something to be given to them.

Yeah, I walked into that with my eyes open. Take a look at the starting point, the following internet meme.



Did I miss something or should I be moving away from this individual's collective before it does dominate 'my collective' and impose reparations as a 'Final Solution' to 'racism?

Or wait a while longer hoping for clarity.