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THE RIGHT’S NEW TARGET: “THE ODYSSEY”–PART TWO (END)

In Business, Entertainment, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on July 29, 2026 at 12:10 am

Most of what Americans believe about the ancient world comes from blockbuster movies—many of them dating back to the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s.

Among those beliefs: 

THE ISRAELITES WERE THE GOOD GUYS. That’s because Biblical movies were based (often loosely) on Old Testament stories. And the Old Testament was written by Israelites.

  • The Israelites were never portrayed as being as ruthless as their enemies, despite this instruction in Jeremiah 51:22-23: “With you I will shatter men and women, old people and children, young men and maidens. With you I will shatter shepherds and flocks, farmers and oxen, captains and rulers.” 
  • “Sansom and Delilah” (1949) and “The Ten Commandments” (1956), pitted noble Israelites against, respectively, evil Philistines and Egyptians. 
  • Even when a major figure like King David (Gregory Peck in “David and Bathsheba” (1951) committed major sins like adultery and murder, the movie ended on a high note: God forgives him and sends rain to quench a parched Israel.

A big difference once existed between how audiences treated movies based on Greek mythology and those based on the Bible.

Audiences were content to enjoy films based on Greek myths without taking them seriously. But those watching movies based on Bible stories assumed they were watching history unfolding before them.

This was never truer than audiences’ reaction to director Mel Gibson’s 2004 blockbuster, The Passion of the Christ. Orthodox Christians flocked to the movie, which blamed Jesus’ crucifixion on Jewish high priests, not the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate.

A sepia colored image showing the face of bearded man covered in blood, on his head is a crown of thorns.

Now audiences seem to believe that “The Odyssey” is delivering history, not mythology. When the first trailer was released in December, critics said that Odysseus’s boat looked like a “Viking ship.” 

“I wonder whether we have become inclined to treat mythological material as though it were historical material,” said Susan Deacy, professor of Classics at the University of Roehampton and the author of The Greek Gods and Their Worlds. “Yet the Odyssey is continually being reimagined, with pretty well every age producing its own Homer.” 

Many viewers were surprised to hear British actors, such as Tom Holland, speaking with American accents and using modern, contemporary expressions. 

But Deacy said this is based on cinematic tradition, not historical accuracy. The ancient Greeks did not speak either modern American English or formal British English. So conversational language may actually be closer to the spirit of Homer’s oral storytelling than the formal style often used in historical films.

Susan Deacy

Susandeacy, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

Audiences didn’t “treat mythological material as though it were historical material” in 2004, when Wolfgang Peterson’s “Troy” hit movie screens. It featured Brad Pitt as Achilles, Eric Bana as Hector, Orlando Bloom as Paris, Sean Bean as Odysseus and Diane Kruger as Helen.

Among its deviations from Homer and Greek mythology:

  • Menelaus, the husband of Helen, is killed by Hector (instead of returning to Sparta with Helen).
  • Agamemnon is killed during the fall of Troy by Briseis, the woman once held captive by Achilles. (According to Greek myth, he was murdered, upon his return home, by his wife, Clytemnestra.)
  • Achilles infiltrates Troy in the wooden horse—and is killed on the city’s last night. (Greek mythology has him killed at the gates of Troy before the Greeks erected the Trojan horse.)
  • Most incredibly, Paris and Helen escape Troy to presumably find happiness somewhere else. (In Greek mythology, Menelaus intends to kill Helen for running off with Paris. But when he sees her, she bares her still-magnificent breasts and yells: “Kill me!” He’s so dumbstruck by her beauty he drops his sword and walks hand-in-hand with her to his ship for the voyage home.)

For those seeking a movie that adhere closely to the Iliad, the winner, hands down, is “The Fury of Achilles” (1962). It’s an Italian drama set in the tenth year of the Trojan War directed by Marino Girolami and starring Gordon Mitchell as Achilles.

It lacks the spectacle of “Troy” (owing to CGI) but is surprisingly sympathetic to its main characters—Achilles, Hector and Priam.

In one deeply moving scene, Achilles tells Briseis that every other Greek soldier hopes to return home, but he is doomed to die at Troy. He knows he has a vulnerable spot, but he doesn’t know where it is. He knows he is fated to kill Hector, Troy’s finest warrior—and that he himself will die soon afterward. 

Fury of Achilles (1962) - IMDb

Hector is similarly treated with sympathy, knowing he must die—and that when he does, his beloved city will soon follow him. But then he kills Achilles’ dear companion, Patroclus, and feels obligated to accept Achilles’ challenge to single combat.

And finally there is Priam, king of Troy, who, as in Homer, movingly pleads to Achilles for the body of his son, Hector. Achilles answers: “Your son is luckier than I. He has a father who mourns him. Who will mourn me when I’m gone? My father is dead.”

And elderly Priam replies: “If I am still alive when you are dead, I will mourn you as another son I have lost.”

At which point a sorrowful Achilles hands over the body of Hector to his grieving father—and the movie, like the Iliad, comes to an end.

THE RIGHT’S NEW TARGET: “THE ODYSSEY”–PART ONE (OF TWO)

In Business, Entertainment, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on July 28, 2026 at 12:17 am

Once again, the Right is enraged—this time, at a movie. 

And not just any movie—“The Odyssey,” which looks to be the blockbuster hit of the summer.

It’s based on the epic poem, allegedly written by Homer, who lived between the eighth and ninth centuries. And while Homer likely earned nothing from his work, the film version of it opened with an estimated $124.5 million in domestic ticket sales and another $139.6 million from overseas, 

Its director, Christopher Nolan, garnered the 2023 Best Picture Oscar for “Oppenheimer.” With a production budget of $250 million, it’s among the most expensive R-rated movies ever made. Universal is spending $125 million to market it.

Picture of director Christopher Nolan smiling at the premiere of The Odyssey in New York

Christopher Nolan

PhilipRomano, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0&gt;, via Wikimedia Commons

The movie stars Matt Damon (the “Ryan” in 1998’s “Saving Private Ryan”) as Odysseus, Tom Holland as his son, Telemachus; Anne Hathaway as his long-suffering wife, Penelope; Zendaya as the goddess, Athena; Robert Pattinson as the suitor Antinous and Charlize Theron as the sea nymph Calypso.

So far, so good—for the Right.

But then comes the “controversial” part: Nolan cast Lupita Nyong’o, a black actress, as Helen of Troy and Elliot Page (a “transitioning” actor) as a soldier.

Right-wingers are furious that that a black woman has been cast as Helen. 

Film poster showing Odysseus (Matt Damon) standing in a battle position, with the Trojan Horse behind him, engulfed in ash and smoke.

Right-wing commentator Matt Walsh wrote on X: “Not one person on the planet actually thinks that Lupita Nyong’o is ‘the most beautiful woman in the world.’ But Christopher Nolan knows that he would be called racist if he gave ’the most beautiful woman’ role to a white woman. Nolan is technically talented but a coward.” 

Elon Musk charged: “Chris Nolan has lost his integrity.” And he vowed that that before the end of 2026, his AI tool Grok “will make a full-length movie of ‘The Odyssey’ that is historically accurate and true to the art of Homer.” 

“By historically accurate, he means whiter than Christmas at Cracker Barrel,” comedian Colman Domingo joked during his stint as guest host on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!”

The Right’s fury can’t be based on the historical record—because the Odyssey is not history, but mythology. And according to ancient Greek myth, Helen was hatched from an egg laid after her mother was visited by Zeus in the form of a swan.

The Helen that Right-wingers envision is a product of Hollywood movie casting.

Sponsored Ad - Odyssey, The

Troy did exist, and was located in northwestern Anatolia, in present-day Çanakkale province, Turkey. It lay just a few miles south of the Dardanelles strait, which connects the Aegean Sea to the Black Sea. This put the city in a highly strategic position controlling major ancient trade routes.

As a result, the famous Trojan War might well have been fought over conflicts in trade, rather than the alleged seduction/kidnapping of Helen, Queen of Sparta, by Paris, prince of Troy.

On the other hand, wars have been fought over perceived slights to the ego of one ruler by another. In William Shakespeare’s play, Henry V, the French Dauphin mocks Henry by sending him tennis balls, implying that Henry is a callow youth rather than a serious monarch. This leads Henry to invade France.

As for Elliot Page: Transgender surgery did not exist in the time of Homer. But homoerotic relationships certainly did—most famously among Greek soldiers.

Today, Right-wingers like Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth fear that homosexuals make poor soldiers. But their choice in sex partners did not prevent the army of Alexander the Great from conquering most of the known world of his time.

The truth is that most of what Americans think they know about the ancient world comes not from scholarly books but blockbuster movies—many of them dating back to the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s.

Among those beliefs:

THE ANCIENT ROMANS SPOKE WITH BRITISH ACCIDENTS. That’s because British actors played Roman aristocrats in so many movies during the 1950s and 1960s. 

  • Laurence Oliver, Peter Ustinov and Charles Laughton played high-born Romans in “Spartacus” (1960) and Richard Burton and Rex Harrison played them in “Cleopatra” (1963).
  • Romans didn’t speak English. They spoke Latin—which at that time was the language of world commerce. Today, it’s not used as a primary mother tongue in any community. A movie whose characters spoke Latin would find itself with an extremely small audience. 

Laurence Olivier - Spartacus

Laurence Oliver in “Spartacus”

SPARTANS WERE THE GOOD GUYS. “The 300 Spartans” (1962) and “300” (2006) celebrate the three-day battle of Thermopylae, where 300 Spartans and 6,700 other Greeks held the narrow pass against a huge Persian army. If the Spartans existed today, these films could serve as recruiting advertisements for their skill at war.

So far, so good.

What these films don’t say:

  • The Spartans ruled a slave empire whose people farmed the land, supplied food and served as military laborers. Their forced labor gave Spartans the freedom to focus completely on military training. 
  • Once a year, Spartans were allowed to murder any helot they desired, just to remind their slaves who was boss.
  • Spartan men were required to live apart from their wives in all-male barracks—and sneak out to have conjugal visits with their wives.
  • Homosexuality played a major role in the lives of Spartans.

SECURITY THEATER IS ONLY THEATER–NOT SECURITY

In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on July 24, 2026 at 12:10 am

In 2005—four years after 9/11—Congress passed the Real ID Act as a counter-terrorism measure. Its goal was to set security standards for government-issued IDs.

The Act was introduced in late 2013. But it wasn’t until September 10, 2020, that the Department of Homeland Security announced that all 50 states were in compliance in issuing identification complying with the standards of the Act.

Only those holding such ID may pass through airport security—for domestic flights as well as international ones—and enter certain federal facilities. 

So what is the easiest way to get a REAL ID? 

According to the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA):

“Visit your state’s driver’s licensing agency website to find out exactly what documentation is required to obtain a REAL ID. At a minimum, you must provide documentation showing:

  • 1) Full Legal Name
  • 2) Date of Birth
  • 3) Social Security Number
  • 4) Two Proofs of Address of Principal Residence, and
  • 5) Lawful Status (if you’re an immigrant)”

Spotlight: TSA | Government Solutions

So much of what passes for security is actually security theater. It doesn’t actually make us safer, but it makes us feel safer. 

And it makes us feel the government is keeping us safe, even when it isn’t. 

Consider:

After 9/11, thousands of National Guard troops were deployed to airports nationwide as a highly visible show of force to deter further attacks and reassure a panicked public. The public would not have felt so reassured had it known the Guards were carrying unloaded M-16 rifles. 

In addition, these “weekend warriors” were not trained detectives. So they didn’t know how to spot a potential terrorist—although they were a likely deterrent against purse-snatchers.

Other examples of security theater include:

  • Mandatory shoe removals and random bag searches at TSA checkpoints:  Have repeatedly failed to detect test weapons and contraband in internal red-team audits.
  • Installing highly visible, non-functional security cameras to deter shoplifters or vandals: If the feed isn’t monitored or recording, it offers zero protective value.
  • Stationing uniformed—but untrained—“security guards” in such places as stores and banks: Usually they lack even rudimentary training in firearms, unarmed combat and/or first aid.

Related image

Sample state ID card that’s acceptable under the Real ID Act

Consider this: A friend of mine—whom I’ll call Jack—recently applied for a Real ID card as issued by the California Department of Motor Vehicles. He brought a certified copy of his birth certificate, bills from AT&T and Pacific Gas and Electric.

The birth certificate easily passed muster. But for a moment there was a problem with the bills from the utility companies: Jack had been getting his mail through a P.O. box, rather than at the apartment building where he lived.

And the “examiner” wanted to see a document with his home address on it.

Fortunately, Jack was able to fish out another bill with that on it. The “examiner” was satisfied, and Jack left the DMV assured that he would soon receive his TSA-approved Real ID card. 

So: How does showing a utility bill document prove your integrity? 

No doubt Mohammed Atta—the ringleader of the September 11, 2001 attacks—faithfully paid his utility bills—right up to the day when he highjacked American Airlines Flight 11 and crashed the plane into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. 

And, yes, a birth certificate proves you were born in the United States—but so was Timothy McVeigh, who, in 1995, blew up the Oklahoma City Federal Building, killing 168 people.

Nor does a “school document”—which can get you a Real ID card—reveal anything about the character of the person.

Theodore Bundy attended the University of Puget Sound and the University of Washington—before embarking on his career as a burglar, kidnapper, rapist and serial killer.

Another form of security theater includes checking photo IDs to enter State and Federal office buildings. 

Knowing a person’s identity is useful—if you have a reliable database system to match it against, such as the FBI’s National Crime Information Center (NCIC). 

National Crime Information Center | Earth: Final Conflict Wiki | Fandom

But if you lack this, forcing people to “show me your ID” is pointless. And that’s assuming the ID isn’t fraudulent.

But people watching the guard performing this security theater ritual assume: “The guard must know what he’s looking for. So we have to be safer for his checking those IDs.”

In fact, most security guards have little training and even less experience. Many of them don’t carry firearms and lack self-defense skills.

According to Salary.com: The median annual salary for an unarmed security guard is $38,697. 

Not exactly a salary geared to attract “the best and the brightest,” is it?

Making all of this even more infuriating: In August, 2021, at least 76,000 unvetted Afghans were admitted into the United States.

The reason: They were too cowardly to fight the Taliban.

Americans had spent 20 years training them to do just that. And as soon as the Taliban launched a major offensive, they fled to Kabul Airport—leaving their wives, girlfriends, mothers and sisters behind to face slavery and brutality.

So while cowardly Afghans—many of whom no doubt had terrorist backgrounds—didn’t have to prove themselves trustworthy, lifelong and law-abiding Americans must.

ILLEGAL ALIENS–THE WORLD’S UNWNTEDS: PART FIVE (END)

In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on July 9, 2026 at 12:19 am

If Americans decide they truly want to control access to their own borders, there is a realistic way to accomplish this.        

And it doesn’t involve building a wall along the Mexican border—which would prove ridiculously expensive and easily circumvented.

(1) The Justice Department should vigorously attack the “sanctuary movement” that officially thwarts the immigration laws of the United States.

Among the 31 “sanctuary cities” of this country: Washington, D.C.; New York City; Los Angeles; Chicago; San Francisco; Santa Ana; San Diego; Salt Lake City; Phoenix; Dallas; Houston; Austin; Detroit; Jersey City; Minneapolis; Miami; Denver; Baltimore; Seattle; Portland, Oregon; New Haven, Connecticut; and Portland, Maine.

These cities have adopted “sanctuary” ordinances that do not allow municipal funds or resources to be used to enforce federal immigration laws, usually by not allowing police or municipal employees to inquire about one’s immigration status.

(2) The most effective way to combat this movement: Indict the highest-ranking officials of those cities which have actively violated Federal immigration laws.

In San Francisco, for example, former District Attorney Kamala Harris—who was once Vice President of the United States—created a secret program called Back on Track, which provided training for jobs that illegal aliens could not legally hold.

She also prevented Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from deporting even those illegal aliens convicted of a felony.

(3) Indicting such officials would be comparable to the way that President Andres Jackson dealt with the threat South Carolinians once made to “nullify”—or ignore—any Federal laws they didn’t like.

Jackson quashed that threat by making one of his own: To lead an army into that State and purge all who dared defy the laws of the Federal Government.

(4) Even if some indicted officials escaped conviction, the results would prove worthwhile. 

City officials would be forced to spend huge sums of their own money for attorneys and face months or even years of prosecution.

And this, in turn, would send a devastating warning to officials in other “sanctuary cities” that the same fate lies in store for them.

(5)  CEOs whose companies—like Wal-Mart—systematically employ illegal aliens should be held directly accountable for the actions of their subordinates.

They should be indicted by the Justice Department under the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, the way Mafia bosses are prosecuted for ordering their own subordinates to commit crimes.

Upon conviction, the CEO should be sentenced to a mandatory prison term of at least twenty years.

This would prove a more effective remedy for combating illegal immigration than stationing tens of thousands of soldiers on the U.S./Mexican border. CEOs forced to account for their subordinates’ actions would take drastic steps to ensure that their companies strictly complied with Federal immigration laws.

Without employers luring illegal aliens at a fraction of the money paid to American workers, the flood of such illegal job-seekers would quickly dry up.

(6) The Government should stop granting automatic citizenship to “anchor babies” born to illegal aliens in the United States.

A comparable practice would be allowing bank robbers who had eluded the FBI to keep their illegally-obtained loot.

A person who violates the bank robbery laws of the United States is legally prosecutable for bank robbery, whether he’s immediately arrested or remains uncaught for years. The same should be true for those born illegally within this country.

If they’re not here legally at the time of birth, they should not be considered citizens and should—like their parents—be subject to deportation.

(7) The United States Government—from the President on down—should stop apologizing for the right to control the country’s national borders.

The Mexican Government doesn’t hesitate to apply strict laws to those immigrating to Mexico. And it feels no need to apologize for this.

Neither should we.

(8) Voting materials and ballots should be published in one language—English. 

In Mexico, voting materials are published in one language—Spanish.

Throughout the United States, millions of Mexican illegals refuse to learn English and yet demand that voting materials and ballots be made available to them in Spanish.

(9) Those who are not legal citizens of the United States should not be allowed to vote in its elections.

In Mexico, those who are not Mexican citizens are not allowed to participate in the country’s elections. 

The Mexican Government doesn’t consider itself racist for strictly enforcing its immigration laws.

The United States Government should not consider itself racist for insisting on the right to do the same.

(10) The United States should impose economic and even military sanctions against countries—such as China and Mexico—whose citizens make up the bulk of illegal aliens. 

The Mexican government well remembers the 10-year Mexican Revolution (1910 – 1920) starring Francisco “Pancho” Villa, Emiliano Zapata and a host of other equally ruthless killers—and the one million dead men, women and children it produced.

So Mexico uses its American border to rid itself of those who might demand major reforms in the country’s political and economic institutions. 

Such nations must learn that dumping their unwanteds on the United States now comes at an unaffordably high price.  Otherwise those dumpings will continue. 

ILLEGAL ALIENS–THE WORLD’S UNWANTEDS: PART FOUR (OF FIVE)

In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on July 8, 2026 at 12:06 am

On May 8, 2018, United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that a “zero-tolerance” policy toward people illegally entering the United States might separate families while parents are prosecuted.        

“We don’t want to separate families, but we don’t want families to come to the border illegally and attempt to enter into this country improperly,” Sessions said. “The parents are subject to prosecution while children may not be. So, if we do our duty and prosecute those cases, then children inevitably for a period of time might be in different conditions.”

Children who were separated from their parents would be put under supervision of the U.S. Health and Human Services Department, Sessions said.

Jeff Sessions

Thomas Homan, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s acting director, backed up Sessions’ “get tough” policy change: “Every law enforcement agency in this country separates parents from children when they’re arrested for a crime. There is no new policy. This has always been the policy.”

That policy soon went into effect. And it generated widespread outrage by

  1. Civil liberties organizations; and
  2. Those who believe the United States should not have—or enforce—its immigration laws.

“Criminalizing and stigmatizing parents who are only trying to keep their children from harm and give them a safe upbringing will cause untold damage to thousands of traumatized families who have already given up everything to flee terrible circumstances in their home countries,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty International’s Americas director.

In fact, alien-smugglers have increasingly used children as a wedge against American immigration laws. Their strategy: “Surely, Americans won’t arrest innocent children—or the adults who bring children with them.

The Trump administration set out to prove them wrong.

This is typical behavior for law enforcement agencies: When criminals devise new ways to defeat existing police measures, the police devise new ways to counter those methods.

Meanwhile, those who believe the United States should throw open its doors to everyone who wants to enter are missing—or ignoring—a vital historical lesson.

Ironically, Mexico knows even better than the United States the perils of unchecked illegal immigration. 

In 1821, Moses Austin sought a grant from Mexico to settle Texas. After he died in 1821, his son, Stephen, won recognition of the grant by Mexico.

The Mexican government had been unable to persuade large numbers of its own citizens to move to Texas, owing largely to raiding by such fierce Indian tribes as the Comanches.

The government saw the Anglo settlement of Texas as its best hope to tame an otherwise untamable frontier.

Stephen Austin

Austin convinced numerous American settlers to move to Texas, and by 1825 he had brought the first 300 American families into the territory.

Throughout the 1820s, Austin helped ensure the introduction of slavery into Texas, even though, under Mexican law, this was illegal. Tensions developed between unchecked numbers of Anglo settlers flooding into Texas and the Mexican authorities in charge there.

(“GTT”—“Gone to Texas”—was often carved on cabin doors by debt-ridden settlers who decided to seek their fortune in Texas. And some of the most notorious criminals on the frontier—such as slave-trader, land swindler and knife-fighter James Bowie—joined them.)

James Bowie

Eventually, the irresistible force of unlimited Anglo illegal immigration rebelled against the immovable object of Mexican legal/military authority. 

The result:

  • The battle of the Alamo: From February 23 to March 6, 1836, about 200 rebellious Texans withstood a 13-day siege in a former San Antonio mission, only to be slaughtered to the last man by an army of 2,000 Mexican soldiers commanded by President (actually, dictator) Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. Among the victims: James Bowie and former Congressman David Crockett.  
  • The massacre at Goliad:  On March 27, 1836, 425-445 Texans captured after the battle of Coleto were shot en masse by Mexican soldiers.
  • The battle of San Jacinto:  On April 21, 1836, Texans led by General Sam Houston won a surprise Texas victory over Mexican forces who were caught in a mid-afternoon siesta. Santa Anna—who had fled—was captured the next day. 

Mexico was forced to give up all rights to Texas—which, nine years after winning its independence, became a state.

But ongoing conflicts between Mexico and the United States over Texas led to the Mexican war in 1846.

This, in turn, led to a series of devastating American victories over the Mexican army, and the capture of Mexico City itself.

Should the USA return to Mexico all the land it took from them during its imperialist stage? - Quora

Territory (in brown) that Mexico lost after the Mexican War

Mexico suffered the humiliation of both military defeat and the loss of its land holdings within the American Southwest—which, up to 1848, it had controlled. 

This territory later became the states of California, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada, Arizona, Texas, and western Colorado. 

And the United States finally spread “from sea to shining sea.”

So Mexico knows what it’s doing when it unloads millions of its own citizens—and those of other Latin and Central American countries—on the United States.

Mexico, in short, is a textbook case of what happens to a country that is unable to enforce its own immigration laws.

ILLEGAL ALIENS–THE WORLD’S UNWANTEDS: PART THREE (OF FIVE)

In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on July 7, 2026 at 12:29 am

On January 31, 2020, the United Kingdom (UK) withdrew from the European Union (EU).        

The United Kingdom—England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—had been a member state of the EU or its predecessor, the European Communities (EC), since January 1, 1973.

The vote had been a long time coming—and a major reason for it lay in the unrestricted immigration—legal and illegal—of Central and Eastern Europeans, who are allowed by EU regulations to freely live and work in any member state.

United Kingdom PDF Map

The United Kingdom

So the United Kingdom decided it would no longer be an EU member state. 

Britons believed that migrants were clogging Britain’s health-care system and schools, while also depressing wages. By leaving the EU, Britons believed they could gain more control over their borders and drastically reduce immigration.

Immigration, the economy and health care had long been the top three issues on British voters’ minds.

The number of foreign-born people living in the UK went from 2.3 million in 1993 (when Britain joined the EU) to 8.2 million in 2014.

By 2020, the non-UK-born population was 9.5 million and the non-British population was 6.1 million. Most of these came from other EU countries: Cyprus, Malta, Croatia, Africa, the Middle East and Asia.

India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were the top three countries with the highest number of UK passport holders.   

Critics of Brexit have blamed xenophobia for Britain’s leaving the EU. While that may have been true, it ignores a vital truth: People feel most comfortable around others like themselves. 

In schools and prisons, it’s commonplace to see white sitting among whites, blacks sitting among blacks and Hispanics sitting among Hispanics.

In addition, people feel most comfortable among those who speak their own language. In the United States, there has been widespread resentment over having to “Push 1 for English” when calling government agencies.

Two factors are driving unprecedented levels of world migration: 

  • The world’s population at 8.1 billion, which puts unprecedented stress on available food, housing, medical care and other essential services; and 
  • The rapid escalation of climate change has brought drought/flooding to major parts of Africa, Asia and Latin and Central America.

Added to these must be an insight into human character offered by Niccolo Machiavelli, the sixteenth-century historian and political scientist, in his work, The Discourses

Quote by Machiavelli: “Necessity is what impels men to take action ...

Niccolo Machiavelli 

It was a saying of ancient writers, that men afflict themselves in evil, and become weary of the good, and that both these dispositions produce the same effects. 

For when men are no longer obliged to fight from necessity, they fight from ambition, which passion is so powerful in the hearts of men that it never leaves them, no matter to what height they may rise. 

The reason for this is that nature has created men so that they desire everything, but are unable to attain it.  Desire being thus always greater than the faculty of acquiring, discontent with what they have and dissatisfaction with themselves result from it. 

This causes the changes in their fortunes—for as some men desire to have more, while others fear to lose what they have, enmities and war are the consequences.  And this brings about the ruin of one province and the elevation of another.

In addition: Those who have spent their lives as law-abiding citizens resent it when immigrants—especially illegal aliens—gain advantage by breaking the law. 

Such a case occurred on January 1, 2024.

That was when California became the first state to offer health insurance to all illegal aliens. All of these uninvited foreigners, regardless of age, now qualify for Medi-Cal, California’s version of the federal Medicaid program for people with low incomes.

Previously, illegal aliens could receive only emergency and pregnancy-related services under Medi-Cal as long as they met eligibility requirements, including income limits and California residency in 2014.

In 2015, then-Governor Jerry Brown allowed illegal alien children to receive coverage under Medi-Cal.

The final expansion starting January 1 will give full coverage to at least 700,000 illegal aliens who have no right to be in the country. 

At the same time, about 3.2 million California citizens remained uninsured in 2022. 

Meanwhile, California faces a record $68 billion budget deficit. Tax collections are off by $26 billion,  combined with the economic slowdown California has been facing since 2022.

News stories announcing this taxpayers’ giveaway don’t refer to the recipients as “illegal aliens.” That’s because “illegal alien” is—for all its accuracy—Politically Incorrect. 

Instead, those who defend the wanton violating of American immigration laws prefer the term “undocumented immigrant.”

As though these lawbreakers had valid citizenship documents but somehow lost them during their swim across the Rio Grande.   

It’s entirely natural that those living in abject poverty—as millions do in Asia, Africa and Latin/Central America—want to escape it.

It’s also entirely natural that those who have escaped poverty want to hold on to all they have worked hard to attain.

The refusal of liberal politicians—in England, Italy, France, Germany and the United States—to accept these truths has led to the rise of authoritarian, Right-wing movements in those countries.

By refusing to address rising anger over such invasions, liberal politicians throughout the world are endangering the very democracies they cherish.

ILLEGAL ALIENS–THE WORLD’S UNWANTEDS: PART TWO (OF FIVE)

In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on July 6, 2026 at 12:10 am

In May 20, 2010, Mexico’s then-President Felipe Calderon addressed a joint session of the United States Congress—and attacked a recently-enacted Arizona law that allowed law enforcement officials to detain anyone suspected of being in the country illegally.       

According to Calderon, the law “introduces a terrible idea: Using racial profiling as a basis for law enforcement.  

“I have said that Mexico does not stop at its border, that wherever there is a Mexican, there is Mexico.”

The hypocrisy of Calderon’s words was staggering. He was condemning the United States for doing what Mexico itself has long done: Strictly enforcing control of its own borders.

Felipe Calderon 

World Economic ForumCopyright by World Economic Forum / Photo by Remy Steinegger 

Mexico’s immigration laws state: Any foreigner that enters the country to stay less than six months is considered a visitor. To meet immigration requirements, you must: 

  • Have enough money to pay for your stay in the country;
  • Have an invitation from a private or public interest organization.   

If you want to stay more than 180 days, you must obtain a temporary residency visa in Mexico. This requires you to:

  • Have a family relationship with a Mexican citizen.
  • Have a job offer issued by a Mexican employer.
  • Have an invitation from a private or public institution.
  • Have enough money to pay for your stay in the country.
  • Own real estate in Mexico.
  • Have investments in Mexico.

After being a temporary resident for four years, you can apply for permanent residency.  To obtain this, you must meet these requirements:

  • Be a refugee or under the condition of political asylum.
  • Have a family relationship with a Mexican citizen.
  • To have been a temporary resident for four years.
  • Be a pensioner with enough monthly income to pay for your stay in the country.
  • Be related in a straight line up to the second degree to a Mexican by birth.
  • To have been a temporary resident for two years in the case of a conjugal or concubine relationship with a Mexican citizen or permanent resident.

Eight years after Calderon demanded that Americans repeal their immigration laws, Mexicans suddenly discovered they hated illegal aliens, too.

On October 13, 2018, a caravan of at least 5,000 men, women and children from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras set out for the United States.

On October 18, President Donald Trump closed the U.S.-Mexico border to keep the caravan from entering the country.

By November 19, migrants had begun piling up in Tijuana, which borders San Diego.

Suddenly, Tijuana residents began carrying signs reading “No illegals,” “No to the invasion” and “Mexico First.” And marching in the streets wearing Mexico’s red, white and green national soccer jersey and vigorously waving Mexican flags. 

“We want the caravan to go; they are invading us,” said Patricia Reyes, a 62-year-old protester. “They should have come into Mexico correctly, legally, but they came in like animals.”  

The El Paso Times noted the resentment of many Mexicans toward the increasing numbers of Cuban illegal aliens in Juarez, which lies across from El Paso.

“They don’t get along with Mexican people,” said a burrito seller. “They get in a little group by themselves. A lot of people don’t like them here.”

And a business consultant complained, “There are people who are coming looking for a handout, who want us to help them, when they could also look for work.”

Over the weekend of October 12-13, 2019, a National Guard commander addressed his platoon before confronting the latest caravan: “No one will come to trample our country, our land!”

In the past, Mexicans comprised the largest group of illegal aliens entering the United States. But the Mexican economy has grown and developed to the point where fewer people see the need to emigrate. 

Most illegals are now mostly from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. And there are growing numbers from Haiti, Cuba, various African countries, and even the Middle East. 

During the first eight months of 2019, the number of asylum applications submitted to Mexico’s refugee agency (COMAR) more than tripled, compared to the same period in 2018. As a result, the refugee agency removed the how-to-apply video it once hosted on its website.

In the past, the Mexican Government refused to halt illegal immigration to the United States.

It remembered the bloody upheaval known as the Mexican Revolution. This lasted 10 years (1910-1920) and wiped out an estimated one to two million men, women and children. 

Massacres were common on all sides, with men shot by the hundreds in bullrings or hung by the dozen on trees.

A Mexican Revolution firing squad

All of the major leaders of the Revolution—Francisco Madero, Emiliano Zapata, Venustiano Carranza, Francisco “Pancho” Villa, Alvaro Obregon—died in a hail of bullets.

Francisco “Pancho” Villa

Emiliano Zapata

As a result, every successive Mexican Government lived in the shadow of another such wholesale bloodletting. These officials quietly decided to turn the United States border into a safety valve. 

* * * * *

No other nation has ever allowed itself to become a dumping ground for the world’s unwanteds. And no law—religious or secular—obligates the United States to do so.

Space is limited in schools, hospitals and housing, and the more people who cram into limited spaces, the more frictions they inevitably create. 

As native-born Mexicans are angrily finding out. 

ILLEGAL ALIENS–THE WORLD’S UNWANTEDS: PART ONE (OF FIVE)

In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on July 3, 2026 at 12:06 am

“Good fences make good neighbors.”     

Robert Frost penned those famous words in his 1914 poem, “Mending Wall.”    

For millions of Americans, illegal immigration was the issue empowering the candidacy of Donald Trump to regain the Presidency in 2024.

For them, Frost’s opening line has become gospel: “Something there is that truly loves a wall.” 

A September 16, 2022 article in The Daily Mail headlined:

“America’s $78B Bill for Teaching Schoolkids With Poor English is Rising by BILLIONS in Biden-era Immigration Surge, Study Says, and 76,000 New Language Instructors Are a Tall Order in a Teacher Shortage.”

Among its findings: 

  • One million public school students—ranging from kindergarten to high school—need special training in speaking and writing English.
  • It costs $78 billion each year to educate them.
  • Texas, California, Florida and New York are among the states most burdened with such students.
  • Only three percent of these students are proficient in English when they graduate from high school.
  • These costs are raised by billions owing to an unceasing tide of illegal alien children at the southern border.

These alarming statistics were produced by a study from the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). 

The 5.1 million students lacking English language skills need help in all their classes.

As a result, it costs 15 to 20 percent more to educate them than American-born students who grow up learning English.

Central American migrants seeking asylum reach US-Mexico border in Tijuana - ABC7 San Francisco

Illegal aliens climbing over the border fence 

With the United States facing a severe teacher shortage, some states have lowered their hiring rules to recruit teachers with only a high school diploma.

In 2020, the 5.1 million illegal alien students in public schools cost American taxpayers $78 billion—an $18.8 billion jump from the cost in 2016.

Of those students, 1.15 million were in California, costing the state $19.5 billion. One million more lived in Texas, costing that state $11.4 billion. And 278,000 lived in Florida, at a cost of $3.1 billion.

Only 370,000 teachers nationwide are trained to teach them, and 76,000 more will be needed during the next five years. 

Immigration remains a highly divisive issue among Americans. “Red” Republican states want to close borders. “Blue” Democratic states are more open to newcomers.

Yet even famously liberal enclaves of support for illegal aliens like New York are beginning to have second thoughts about taking in unlimited numbers of uninvited foreigners. 

On October 7, 2022, then-New York City Mayor Eric Adams declared a state of emergency in response to the city’s migrant crisis, which he said would cost the city $1 billion that fiscal year. 

Eric Adams

“We now have a situation where more people are arriving in New York City than we can immediately accommodate, including families with babies and young children,” Adams said.

“Once the asylum seekers from today’s buses are provided shelter, we would surpass the highest number of people in recorded history in our city’s shelter system.”

Behind this unwanted influx lies Texas Governor Greg Abbott.

By May 1, 2025, Texas had spent more than $229 million busing illegal aliens found in Texas to famously liberal supporters of illegal immigration: Washington D.C., New York City and Chicago. 

Abbott announced the program on April 13, 2024, as his response to the Biden administration’s immigration policies. 

Abbott in 2024

Greg Abbott

In October, 2023, New York City had 90,578 people in its shelter system. Thousands of these are American citizens who are homeless. They are competing for assistance with illegal aliens who were bused to New York City from the southern border since April, 2022.

Three Communist-ruled countries—Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba—are responsible for this huge surge in illegal aliens and their continuing drain on America’s schools, housing and hospitals (among other facilities).

Rising levels of repression, food shortages and economic stability are motivating Cubans, Venezuelans and Nicaraguans to enter the United States. And assisting them is the longtime policy of the United States government to automatically accept those leaving Communist countries as refugees.

At some point, the United States must face the economic and social absurdity of allowing some cities and states to provide sanctuary to every illegal alien who appears.

Even Eric Adams, emphasizing that New York City remains a sanctuary city, warned it could not cope with such an overwhelming influx of migrants:

“We are not telling anyone that New York can accommodate every migrant in the city. We’re not encouraging people to send eight, nine buses a day….We’re saying that as a sanctuary city with right to shelter, we’re going to fulfill that obligation. That’s what we’re doing.”

Abbott clearly believes he has the right to inflict thousands of illegal aliens on other states. And illegal aliens clearly believe they have the right to demand unlimited access to the United States.

At some point, America must stop allowing itself to be a dumping-ground for other countries’ unwanteds. 

* * * * *

An “open door” policy proved essential 250 years ago, when most of America was unsettled and largely unpopulated.

But the United States is no longer a largely unpopulated, agricultural country. Most of its population lives in coastal cities—which is where most illegal aliens tend to settle as well.

Space is limited in schools, hospitals and housing, and the more people who cram into limited spaces, the more frictions they inevitably create.

TRUMP AS A TRAGIC HERO?: PART ONE (OF THREE)

In Bureaucracy, Business, Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on June 15, 2026 at 12:10 am

“America needs the outsider Trump to do what normal politicians would not and could not do.”     

That was the assertion made by Victor Davis Hanson, a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, in Palo Alto, California.   

Among his bestsellers on military history:

  • The Second World Wars
  • Carnage and Culture
  • Wars of the Ancient Greeks
  • The Western Way of War
  • The Soul of Battle: How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny

Historian Victor Davis Hanson said there has been no consequences for the wrongdoing by elites in society and warned that republics and successful states fall apart when the elites fall out of touch with the people."We have a whole bunch... here at home, that feel they can dictate to people and they're never subject to the ramifications of their own ideology and policy," he said of elites. "And it's like the emperor has no clothes and then they're surprised that Trump won or surprised that peo

Victor Davis Hanson

In 2019, Hanson turned his attention to politics—specifically, The Case for Trump.

Its dust-jacket provides a useful summary of its contents:

“This New York Times bestselling Trump biography from a major American intellectual explains how a renegade businessman became one of the most successful—and necessary—presidents of all time.

“In The Case for Trump, award-winning historian and political commentator Victor Davis Hanson explains how a celebrity businessman with no political or military experience triumphed over sixteen well-qualified Republican rivals, a Democrat with a quarter-billion-dollar war chest, and a hostile media and Washington establishment to become president of the United States — and an extremely successful president.

“Trump alone saw a political opportunity in defending the working people of America’s interior whom the coastal elite of both parties had come to scorn, Hanson argues. And Trump alone had the instincts and energy to pursue this opening to victory, dismantle a corrupt old order, and bring long-overdue policy changes at home and abroad.”The Case for Trump by Victor Davis Hanson | Basic Books

The Case for Trump | Parnassus Books

Hanson’s book appeared before Trump:

  • Tried to coerce Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to smear former Vice President Joseph Biden, who was likely to be his Democratic opponent in the 2020 Presidential election.
  • Allowed the deadly COVID-19 virus to ravage the country, killing more than 400,000 Americans by the time he left office. 
  • Attacked medical experts and governors who urged Americans to wear masks and socially distance to protect themselves from COVID-19.
  • Ordered his Right-wing followers to defy states’ orders to citizens to stay-at-home and wear masks in public to halt surging COVID-19 rates.
  • Became the first President in American history to refuse to accept the results of a Presidential election. 
  • Tried to overturn the November 3, 2020 election of Joe Biden through 60 lawsuits and the arm-twisting of several state lawmakers.
  • Sent a mob of his fanatical followers to attack the United States Capitol Building. Their mission: Stop the counting of Electoral College ballots certain to give Biden the victory.
  • Was twice impeached during his four years in office—the only President to be impeached twice (and acquitted by a Republican Senate which ignored his litany of crimes).

But his book appeared after Trump had:

  • Fired FBI Director James Comey for pursuing ties between Trump’s 2016 Presidential campaign and Russian Intelligence agents.
  • Tried to fire Independent Counsel Robert S. Mueller III, who was assigned to investigate those ties after Trump fired Comey. 
  • Attacked Attorney General Jeff Sessions for refusing to fire Mueller.
  • Attacked the integrity of Federal judges whose rulings he disagreed with.
  • Gave Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey  Kislyak highly classified CIA Intelligence about an Islamic State plot to turn laptops into concealable bombs.
  • Amassed an infamous record as a serial liar, in both personal and Presidential matters.
  • Attacked the integrity of the American Intelligence community.
  • Sided with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin against the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency which unanimously agreed that Russia had subverted the 2016 Presidential election.
  • Repeatedly attacked the nation’s free press for daring to report his growing list of crimes and disasters, calling it “the enemy of the American people.”
  • Branded America’s longtime ally, Canada, as “a national security threat.”
  • Praised brutal Communist dictators Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.
  • Shut down the Federal Government for 35 days because Democrats refused to fund his ineffective “border wall” between the United States and Mexico.
  • An estimated 380,000 government employees were furloughed and another 420,000 were ordered to work without pay. The shutdown ended due to public outrage—without Trump getting the funding amount he had demanded. 

So much for Hanson’s claims that Trump had been “one of the most successful—and necessary—presidents of all time.”

Related image

Donald Trump

Then there’s Hanson’s claim that “Trump alone saw a political opportunity in defending the working people of America’s interior whom the coastal elite of both parties had come to scorn.” 

In November, 2017, Trump and a Republican-dominated House and Senate rammed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 through Congress. It became law on December 22, 2017.

According to Chye-Ching Huang, Director of Federal Fiscal Policy, the law did nothing to help ordinary Americans.

Testifying before the House Budget Committee on February 27, 2019, Huang stated that the law:

  • Ignored the stagnation of working-class wages and worsened inequality;
  • Weakened revenues when the nation needed to raise more;  
  • Encouraged rampant tax avoidance and gaming that will undermine the integrity of the tax code; 
  • Left behind low- and moderate-income Americans—and in many ways hurt them.

For American corporations, however, the law was a godsend: 

  • Cutting the corporate tax rate from 35 to 21 percent;
  • Shifting toward a territorial tax system, where multinational corporations’ foreign profits go largely untaxed;
  • Benefitting overwhelmingly wealthy shareholders and highly paid executives.

This was hardly an attempt at “defending the working people of America’s interior.”

Trump never made another attempt to “reform” the tax laws.

STEPHEN COLBERT: TRIUMPHANT IN DEFEAT: PART TWO (END)

In Bureaucracy, Business, Entertainment, History, Politics, Social commentary on May 27, 2026 at 12:10 am

On July 14, 2025, after returning from a multi-week break, Stephen Colbert, host of CBS’ Late Night With Stephen Colbert, said: “While I was on vacation, my parent corporation, Paramount, paid Donald Trump a $16 million settlement over his ‘60 Minutes’ lawsuit.    

“I believe this kind of complicated financial settlement with a sitting government official has a technical name in legal circles—it’s big fat bribe.” 

Meanwhile, Paramount Global, the parent company of CBS Network, wanted to merge with Skydance Media.

For this, it needed the regulatory permission of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) of the Trump administration.

On July 17, CBS cancelled the highest-rated late-night show on television with 2.4 million nightly viewers. It had also been nominated for 33 Emmys.

Addressing his in-house and television audience on July 17, Colbert announced: “I want to let you know something that I found out just last night. Next year will be our last season. The network will be ending The Late Show in May.

“It’s not just the end of our show, but it’s the end of The Late Show on CBS. I’m not being replaced. This is all just going away.” 

In a statement, Paramount/CBS called the cancellation a purely financial decision: “It is not related in any way to the show’s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount.” 

Colbert did not directly accuse his bosses of bowing to pressure from the FCC. But he did offer this insightful comment: “Less than two years before they called to say it’s over, they were very eager for me to be signed for a long time. So, something changed.”

What “changed” was that after CBS cancelled one of Trump’s biggest critics, the merger between Paramount Global and Skydance Media was quickly approved by the FCC.

Federal Communications Commission - Wikipedia

David Letterman had hosted The Late Show with David Letterman from August 30, 1993, until his retirement on May 20, 2015.

Ed Sullivan Theater - Wikipedia

On his last night as host of The Late Show Colbert did exactly that, turning what could have been a mournful event into a celebration of joy and defiance.

Stephen Colbert Signs off “Late Show” with Emotional Goodbye https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znec-DIff8o 

Hello, Goodbye: Paul McCartney turns off the lights on 'The Late Show with Stephen Colbert ' | MyCentralOregon.com - Horizon Broadcasting Group, LLC