as seen on tv
Senator
Photo above – a toddler is tossed over the US Mexican wall. US rescuers come under attack.
Not Shown – whether or not this toddler stunt was simply a diversion to allow the gunmen to breach the wall at some other place.
PBS NewsHour full episode, May 25, 2023 - YouTube
FINALLY! . . . last night's PBS Evening News Hour did NOT lead with 15 minutes of talking heads droning about another day of failed budget negotiations. Viewers have had it up to HERE with snippets of the Joe and Kevin reality TV show - grinning, shaking hands and getting nowhere.
Instead, the story of the day was immigration. See link above.
Readers skooled in manipulation of public opinion will be familiar with this concept: the message of the day. The White House decides to push a story – just one concise message – in it's press materials. Typically to get the media to pivot away from something else (a looming budget crisis?). I'm NOT picking on Team Biden here. Trump also did this. Obama . . . Bush . . . It's how politicians try to mold our opinions. They reach out to state affiliated media, and their own party's most ambitious, loquacious senators, and thought leaders. To focus our attention on a single topic. To eclipse a bad story which has been dominating the news cycle the day (or week) before. If you want to learn more about how this works, visit your public library and borrow "Manufacturing Consent", by Noam Chomsky.
PBS obliged everyone last night. Immigration became message of the day. Even though there weren't any new immigration developments. In fact, LAST WEEK, the White House was gleefully crowing that the illegal alien thing was getting better. Because of a dip in the number of migrants climbing, hiking, tunnelling, or swimming across. But how quickly good news can become bad, if it's drafted as the story of the day.
The White House's inspiration may also have been triggered by video of US border agents coming under assault weapons fire from the Mexican-side. The agents were trying to rescue a toddler who had been dropped from 20 feet above on the wall. Or the White House pivot might have been driven by the mass rapes taking place in Mexico's migrant camps. Let's deconstruct the rape story first, since that's what PBS led with. Again – link is at top if you'd rather watch this stuff than read. Nobody will cast shade. It's must-see TV.
In any case, PBS reports that mass rapes are trending in Mexico. By violent, uncontrollable criminals. There was a heartbreaking segment on a mother with two teen daughters. She fled a Mexican migrant camp, because the guys there were so dangerous. Rape was imminent and omnipresent.
Let's stop right here. Is the solution going to be worse than the problem? Now that title 42 has bit the dust, we should let everyone in? Helpless mothers, daughters . . . and the rapists who are assaulting them, too? That's what PBS is going with. Be a humanitarian, let them in.. Hand everyone a hearing notice with a future date and unfamiliar location, and then wish them good luck. Yep – the rapists too. Wolves, come on in with the sheep. Side by side.
Okay, now let's get back to the gunmen on the Mexican side of the wall. The guys with automatic weapons shooting at US border agents rescuing that toddler. WTH? Machine guns?? How do you sneak THESE into a Mexican government camp? I guess you might have to bribe the camp guards or officials? Were these gunmen the toddler's mom and dad? Or human traffickers? Or Cartel soldiers who had tossed the kid over, as a diversion, while they attempted to breach the wall a block or two away? This seems like is a battlefield tactic right out of "The Art of War", by Sun Tzu. He's a Chinese warlord who lived 2,500 years ago. Good reading, and also available at the library.
Mexico didn't arrest any of the shooters, apparently. And none of the rapists either. I can understand if Mexico doesn't want to put its police in harm's way. Those migrant guys sure seem dangerous. But America doesn't need those gangstas here, either. Sorry, we've got enough rapists and deranged, trigger-happy gunmen already.
The sound bite “border security” fails to clarify the situation. Allowing huge numbers of violent guys to cross, and mix with people already here. This fails any reasonable test of public safety. It fails the test of law. If someone asks for a visa at any US embassy or consulate, that's the FIRST thing the immigration guys check out. Is the applicant currently on trial? Or previously convicted – if so, of what? Was he a soldier, or a prison guard for some regime? Putin, China's Xi, Iran's Ayatollah, the PLO, Hezbollah, or some banana republic despot? Those guys have to wait while we check it out. No visa today. Except if you show up at the Mexican border. Just ditch your ID and paperwork.
PBS says ditch the visa process. Just think about the girls being abused. Open the borders. Let them in. Thene, then move on to tomorrow's story of the day. Which at some point will undoubtedly be gun crimes. Homelessness. The epidemic of drug overdoses. A story which will be blamed on budget compromises, not the criminals.
Full disclosure – this writer advocates all sorts of LEGAL immigration – student visas, work visas, tourist visas, spouse visas, medical visas, blood relative visas, humanitarian visas, refugee visas from political persecution in their homeland. As long as they have ID and pass the interview. My welcome doesn't apply to guys without ID, while girls are fending off rape. And while bullets are raining down on US border agents recusing toddlers dropped from high altitude. Check out that picture at the top again. Many thanks and kudos to our border agents. Well done, with that kid! Too bad PBS didn't report THAT story.
