When it comes to illegal immigrants, President Trump’s Administration has a lot of work to do.  Recently, he has been disappointed with the numbers being deported and wants to ramp this up to 1,200 to 1,500 per day.  Not only will this take the focus away from immigrants deemed to be criminals but will cause the wholesale roundup of those that aren’t.  Will this cause ICE officials to go to places that may have a large immigrant work force?  Will this force them to schools and churches to a larger extent?  For more information check the web site “www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2025/01/27/trump-team-focuses-deportations-on-immigration-numbers-not-criminals/”

My thoughts are that this will cause legal as well as illegal immigrants to be detained.  Do you think that the criminal elements will go further underground?  At the “quota” of 1,500 per day, it would take them 20 years to round up all the 11 million illegal immigrants.  Are we ready for this long-term effort causing havoc every single day?  Are we ready to experience this in our factories, on our farms, in churches and schools, in our cities and towns?  If the effort were to bring in a large force of military personnel, could we ever do this in the four-year term of the president?  ICE would need to round-up 7,500 per day.

Do we want our children to experience these effects?  Would we want our citizens to become confidential informants for ICE?  Would we want to watch ICE and possibly the military roam our streets trying to locate these people?  Do we want to be saying our prayers in church as this force pushes through the doors searching our congregations?  Or be waiting outside as we leave?  What are we willing accept?

The administration also wants to reshape our education system under the guise of giving parents more choice in their child’s education.  More on this from Ayelet Sheffey of Business Insider at “www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/trump-rolls-out-his-vision-to-reshape-americas-schools/ar-AA1ygBBq?ocid=BingNewsSerp”.  Yet how are parents allowed this if the federal government begins to dictate how monies can be spent by the states and any possible educational requirements they may have?

I found this at “www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/expanding-educational-freedom-and-opportunity-for-families/”.  I encourage everyone to read this but to read it very carefully.  It dictates how the Department of Education and other governmental departments will work together on guidance for our educational system.  I say to read it carefully because of the following section on this page.

“Sec. 5.  Expanding Opportunities for Low-Income, Working Families.  Within 90 days of the date of this order, the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall issue guidance regarding whether and how states receiving block grants for families and children from the Department, including the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDGB), can use them to expand educational choice and support families who choose educational alternatives to governmental entities, including private and faith-based options.”

This looks like it is expanding opportunities for this group of citizens.  However, in my estimation, one single word in this creates doubt in the ability to help this sector.  It’s the word “whether”.  Why is this a part of this section?  With this single word, States may not be able to provide grants for this group of citizens.  Why would this word be used at all if not for allowing the ability to limit resources?

If there is a push to put all educational funding to the states, we will indeed find that there will be competition between states.  Is this a good thing?  Maybe, but this may also begin to push companies to hire from one state over the other.  If this would occur, couldn’t this eventually force certain states to be worse off than before?  Force them to spend money they don’t have?  Education is part of everything we do and all that we accomplish.  It is the building blocks, no, the cornerstone of our democracy. Previously the government has tried to equalize our states in educational training. Does this reverse this process?

Lastly, companies and other entities, even our government are using our attention span as a commodity.  A good article on this is located at “econreview.studentorg.berkeley.edu/paying-attention-the-attention-economy/”.  Social media has helped with this in the form of “likes” and “dislikes”.  The meaning of these two simple words, however, span a plethora of possibilities.  More likes, more commercialism.  More likes, more positive feelings.  More commercialism and positive feelings, more purchase power being developed and demanded.  These are but a couple of those possibilities.  But there are several uses of our attention span that are damaging.

Today, bullying is beyond the pale.  Children are dying because of this.  Other forms of it such as capturing our digital identity or removing our hard-earned savings or using our identity in negative ways are causing many adults to become scared, depressed, or suicidal.  These are destructive in ways it’s hard for us to imagine.  Yet, they exist.

Wrapped up in all these behaviors is hate.  Though many will not notice or understand this, it is hatred, none-the-less.  Hate is rampant on social media and is “sold” to us via our attention span.  The more we dwell on it the more we believe it.  The more we believe it the more hateful we get.  As we read all the media being sent to us, we must be aware of any underlying hate.  If we don’t pay attention, we may absorb it until one day, we become hateful ourselves.

We must study all aspects of our lives.  Make sure we are helping not hurting.  Loving not hating.  Social media is a wheel that will keep on turning.  Hatred will make that wheel squeak.  The adage “the squeakiest wheel gets the grease” will be thrust on us.  Let’s make sure the grease that’s used is not our blood.