Sherman R. Frederick/Publisher
I don’t know why it’s taking so long to admit that we have an unmanaged crisis on our southern border. The new administration’s immigration policy (whatever in the world it is?) hasn’t fixed a thing, as illustrated by the brutal picture at the top of this column.
It’s of a Nicaraguan kid presenting himself to border agents, tearfully begging for help. He said he was abandoned by smugglers, alone and scared. So, as any good human would, agents took him in, fed and clothed him, and sent him to a number of secretive camps at military bases. This one was in Donna, Texas.
What are the conditions at these camps? We don’t know. News outlets have not been granted access. Soldiers have been ordered not to snap pictures of the facilities or the kids.
The Biden Administration was clearly caught off guard and even now can’t catch up to current conditions fast enough. So, it has defaulted to the government-under-fire position of blacking out the news.
Hide the camps. Deny access and information. No pictures of kids in cages. Out of sight, out of mind. Pretend Vice President Kamala Harris is busy at work solving the “root” problem.
The idea that Biden — or any politician — is a savior for any one issue is delusional. You’re just fooling yourself, kinda like the dude who thinks the waitress really wants to know his name.
If you gave the previous administration holy hell for its immigration policy, you must break out the mega-phone and start screaming bloody murder at what’s happening now. This crisis involves far more children and, alarmingly, our government is anything but transparent.
CLASSIC MOMENT
A funny thing happened at a Palo Alto Council meeting: Somebody blurted out the truth.
It happened during a discussion on homelessness in the ultra-rich progressive town in which leaders were scolded for not doing enough to help. There are about 300 homeless people in Palo Alto, homeless advocates said, but the city has barely lifted a finger to house them. Why isn’t the city building, or providing, more permanent housing for the down and out, they asked?
Amid the silence, a local resident piped up: Because it might attract “more homeless people coming into our city.”
You could have heard a pin drop. (Hat tip to the Mercury News.)
REMEMBER THE ALAMO
Lost in the brouhaha over the San Francisco School Board’s ill-advised attempt to rename schools named for Abraham Lincoln, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson (a decision which is going to be reversed, by the way) somes the instructive story of Alamo Elementary School.
When the school board went crazy erasing school names that in any way “inhibited societal progress,” they scooped up the name of Alamo Elementary and added it to the list of oppressive names.
Only problem is that Alamo doesn’t refer to the Texas battle. The school is named after the Spanish name for the poplar tree.
There’s a valuable lesson in there somewhere for woke revolutionaries in too much of a hurry. You don’t always know what you’re talking about and, as good as it sounds among your echo-chamber circle of friends, you don’t always speak for the wider community.
Paging Drake High School administrators and trustees: This is your wake up call.
THIS IS NOT OK
The pastor of Grace Baptist Church in San Jose delivered his Easter sermon via Zoom when a nut-case hacked into the streamed event and shouted racist slurs and threats.
It continued until finally the church staff stopped the stream.
This sad case goes to show that despite our desire for justice and mercy, there are people out there who simply need to be culled from the herd.
ONE MORE THING
— People ask me if I speak lizard. I don’t, but I iguana some day.
— An ancient Greek walks into a tailor shop with torn pants. “Euripides?” says the tailor. “Yeah, Eumenides?” replies the man.
— The day after marijuna is legalized in the South:
I’m sorry about that Greek pun. I’ll seek help. In the meanwhile, I’ll pick up my knitting and let myself out. Be kind. Question authority.
(Sherman R. Frederick is the founder of Battle Born Media, a newspaper company dedicated to the preservation of community newspapers. He may be reached at shermfrederick@gmail.com.)
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