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My wife got gave me these beautiful ceramic cups for Christmas but one of them was broken once received. I repaired in a faux-kintsugi manner using some gold paint and superglue. Not sure if it will be liquid tight but it looks nice.

My New Year Day Rituals:

  • Making big pots of black-eyed peas and cabbage to eat (I make vegetarian versions)
  • Ordering a Day One printed book of my digital journal for the year.
  • Creating a new journal in Day One for the new year.
  • General nerdy Day One maintenance like making sure previous years digital journal colors match the color of the printed book I chose for that year.
  • Setting up and switching out my Hobonichi Techo and putting last year’s on the appropriate shelf with the rest.

No News is No News

Execupundit.com: Cutting In Line

I like and respect Micheal Wade so I feel compelled to call out a couple of things mentioned in his piece about illegal immigration (which is worth reading for perspective sake).

Think of how many news stories you have seen on the plight of illegal immigrants that even mention individuals who are trying to enter the United States through the legal process.

How many stories was it? Ten? Twenty?

Zero?

This is essentially a “straw man” argument.

How many news stories have you seen on the house that doesn’t ever get broken into? How about the store that didn’t get shoplifted? How about the car that never got into an accident?

How many stories was it? Ten? Twenty?

Zero?

The answer, of course, is also zero. The reason is simple. No news is no news. The news only reports things that are different from the norm. Otherwise, it’s not news. The norm is that the vast majority of houses don’t get broken into. The vast majority of stores don’t experience theft. Most cars never get into an accident.

But you’d never know that from looking at the news because normal isn’t news.

Therefore, you may not be aware that about a million people (sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less) become legal permanent residents of the United States every year through the process we’ve established and have since the 1980’s.

That’s not news so why report it?

You also may not be aware that there are an approximately 10 Million Unauthorized immigrants currently in the United States and that that number has remained mostly stable for almost 20 years.

But here’s a key fact that isn’t reported regularly by the news quoted directly from Pew Research:

Between 2007 and 2021, the unauthorized immigrant population decreased by 1.75 million, or 14%.

Meanwhile, the lawful immigrant population grew by more than 8 million, a 29% increase, and the number of naturalized U.S. citizens grew by 49%.

(emphasis theirs)

But illegal immigration going down doesn’t make a good news story. Neither does lawful immigration going up.

It also doesn’t make a good “us vs. them” campaign point if you’re trying to get certain votes. It also doesn’t fit in with the narrative that we are being overrun by illegal immigrants. That it is a “crisis”. That people are “cutting in line”.

But, and hear me out here, it also will do nothing to assuage the fear that once those people do become citizens they will vote for the people who made that process easier for them, not harder.

Now that I’ve said that, what do you think all this concern about illegal immigration is really about?