The Numbers Game

Hi Gang:
Here is my most recent commentary that was posted on the CAPS (Californians for Population Stabilization) website.
The focus of this commentary, that is attached below, is the deceptive use of statistics to provide a misleading impression about the efforts being made by ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) and CBP )Customs and Border Protection) to enforce our nation’s immigration laws.  
Both ICE and CBP are components of the DHS, an agency that I have come to refer to as the “Department of Homeland Surrender!”
Clearly the administration understands what the great majority of Americans expect of their government- that our nation’s borders be secured and the immigration laws be enforced from within the interior of the United States.  If the administration did not believe that these expectations were of such great importance to the citizens of this nation, they would have no need to create the illusion of enforcement that the false use of statistics is being used for.
This makes the tactics of this administration all the more disturbing!
With so many Americans finding it increasingly difficult to find jobs and support themselves and their families, the fact that millions- likely tens of millions of aliens are working in the United States on jobs that Americans would very much want to do represents a huge betrayal of our citizens and lawful immigrants by the administration and those political “leaders” who continue to talk about the need to place illegal aliens on a “pathway to United States citizenship!”
When corporations “cook the books” the corporate executives are generally criminally prosecuted.  Cooking the books, as you likely know, is the term that describes the altering of information about profits and other relevant data to create misleading illusions about success to encourage more people to invest their hard earned money in those companies.
Today, however, when the government “cooks the books” and the issue has serious national security implications and also involves virtually every threat and challenge that confronts our nation and our citizens, the duplicitous conduct barely raises an eyebrow, because we have come to expect the worst from our government and, tragically, that is precisely what we are getting!  Blue smoke and mirrors is not an effective barrier against those who would come to our country and do us harm!
My dad used to tell me that I would teach people how they should treat me by being clear about what I would or would not accept in dealing with those folks.  We have an obligation to persuade our nation’s leaders, on all levels, to come to terms with the fundamental fact that the purpose of our immigration laws is to protect our nation and our citizens from aliens whose presence has the potential to have a serious adverse impact.  Ignoring those laws exposes our nation and our citizens to a variety of serious threats and challenges ranging from national security and criminal justice and public safety to the economy, the environment, healthcare and education!
A country without secure borders can no more stand than can a house without walls!

I

our country is to survive and if our children and their children are to get their share of the “American Dream” the citizens of this nation must take their citizenship seriously!

We the People must be the best citizens we can be, citizens who are worthy of the gallantry demonstrated by our valiant men and women in the military, law enforcement and firefighters, who routinely go in harm’s way in defense of this nation and our citizens.  
My goal in writing this and other commentaries is to point out our nations many failings before more victims pay the ultimate price for the incompetence and ineptitude of our government.
The first step in problem-solving is to first identify the problems and vulnerabilities and then devise strategies to overcome them.
If you find yourself to be in agreement with this commentary, I ask that you forward it to as many of your friends and family members as possible and encourage them to do the same.  We need to create a “Bucket Brigade of Truth!”

The practice of good citizenship does not end in the voting booth, it only begins there.

For far too long our citizens demonstrated apathy which emboldened elected representatives to all but ignore the needs of the average American citizen in a quest for massive campaign funds and the promises of votes to be ostensibly delivered by special interest groups. 

It is therefore understandable that the politicians of both parties, are greatly concerned about the demonstrations currently sweeping our nation just as did the creation of the Tea Party.  Clearly  more and more of our fellow Americans are demonstrating that they are not as dumb as the politicians from both parties had expected us to be!

I am encouraged that more and more of us, We the People, are not willing to simply sit on the sidelines anymore!

I believe our nation’s is greatly benefited by the rich diversity of our people which is why I could never imagine living anywhere except New York City, arguably the most diverse city in our nation if not, in fact, the world.  However, my idea of diversity most certainly does not include members of MS-13, the Mexican drug cartels or members of other transnational gangs or members of al-Qaeda!

If our government’s failures to secure our nation’s borders and effectively enforce our immigration laws concerns you or especially if it angers you, I ask you to call your Senators and Congressional “Representative. This is not only your right- it is your obligation! 

All I ask is that you make it clear to our politicians that we are not as dumb as they hope we are!

We live in a perilous world and in a perilous era. The survival of our nation and the lives of our citizens hang in the balance.

This is neither a Conservative issue, nor is it a Liberal issue- simply stated, this is most certainly an AMERICAN issue!

You are either part of the solution or you are a part of the problem!

Democracy is not a spectator sport!

Lead, follow or get out of the way!

-michael cutler- 


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The Numbers Game

There is a saying that, “Figures don’t lie but liars can figure!”

Statistics are often used to as a metric to establish the
effectiveness of a program.  Statistics can provide an appearance of
total objectivity and being fact-based    when nothing could be further
from the truth!

Of course statistics can be extremely useful to determine if a
program is working effectively, but the problem is that there are many
artful ways that statistics can  mask reality.  If a student was having a
problem with a class and to the consternation of his parents, was
receiving failing grades in the exams he took in that class he might
want to provide an overly optimistic impression of his progress.  Let’s
say he had received a grade of 30% on an exam and his parents, in
reaction were appropriately upset.  He could be completely honest if he
was to tell them that he had done twice as well on the subsequent test
and hope that they would not do the math and realize that he had still
gotten a failing grade (60%)!

Clearly the administration and just about all politicians understand
that their constituents are truly upset with the continuing failures of
our nation to enforce the immigration laws and secure our nation’s
borders.  Politicians who are desperate to create an immigration
travesty known as “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” have taken to the
tactic of saying that before we can have “Comprehensive Immigration
Reform” our nation must first secure its borders.  (I have written many
commentaries on why Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR) should never
be implemented as a blanket program and why there are so many other
metrics that should be considered when determining whether or not our
laws are really being enforced.) The politicians who want a massive
amnesty program know that proving the “borders are secure” cannot be
shown by direct evidence only by inference. They make the argument that
if arrests by the Border Patrol are lower, that this should be viewed as
evidence that fewer aliens are running our borders and hence our
borders are more secure.

Of course, if the Border Patrol is ordered to protect portions of the
border, especially those portions where aliens are not likely to
attempt to run the border, and agents leave other areas wide open, the
number of arrests will drop while more aliens will continue to flood
across the border.

If Border Patrol agents are disciplined for various and sundry
reasons and even criminally prosecuted for minor infractions or even
fabricated infractions, when they do their jobs, their colleagues will
quickly come to understand that their jobs are hazardous- not only
because they may be injured or killed by the bad guys they are trying to
arrest but by their own agency that places them in harm’s way when they
go on duty each day.

Please do not for a moment misunderstand what I am saying.  Any law
enforcement officer will tell you that the badge they are given when
they are sworn in not only provides them with the authority to do their
sworn duties but to be accountable as well.  Law enforcement officers
must be made accountable for their actions, but they must also be able
to trust that they will be treated fairly and supported by the agencies
that they work for.

When I was an INS Special Agent, we used to have a saying, “Big
cases- big problems, little cases- little problems; no cases- no
problems!”

Every time a law enforcement officer takes official action he (she)
runs the risk of being physically injured by the criminals they
encounter or attempt to arrest or of being falsely accused of doing
something wrong by those same individuals.  Depending on how the agency
they work for deals with allegations of wrongdoing and depending on the
goal of the leadership of the law enforcement agency and the politicians
who ultimately control those agencies, allegations of wrongdoing may be
summarily dismissed or may result in the law enforcement officer being
arrested and prosecuted simply to satisfy the whims of the political
hierarchy.  Clearly it is not only fashionable but politically
expedient, for allegations against those charged with securing our
nation’s borders to be hammered at every opportunity to discourage these
beleaguered agents from doing their jobs!  Remember, if arrests are
down, the argument can be made that the borders are more secure, just as
Janet Napolitano, the Secretary of DHS (Department of Homeland
Surrender) has repeatedly claimed in a succession of public appearances.

Most recently a U.S.
Border Patrol agent by the name of Jesus E. Diaz, Jr. was arrested,
successfully prosecuted and sentenced to serve a two year prison
sentence
for purportedly using excessive force against an illegal
alien drug smuggler who was 15 years old, even though there was no
physical evidence to substantiate that any actions taken by Agent Diaz
were inappropriate, let alone criminal, in nature!

While it is politically expedient to show fewer arrests along our
nation’s southern border to “prove” the border is “secure,” the illusion
that ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) is effectively doing its
job requires that statistics be provided that removals of illegal
aliens have increased.

Of course the use of the term “Removal” rather than “Deportation” is extremely important.

Today the DHS does not even use the term deportation.  Any alien who
is expelled from the United States is considered to have been removed. 
This is an important point because an alien who has been formally
ordered to leave the United States would have been declared to have been
“deported” under the previously accepted nomenclature.  There is total
clarity with this use of language.

Aliens who are provided with the option of agreeing to voluntarily depart the United States are not formally deported.

This is more than a mere legal or linguistic technicality.  An alien
who has been sent out of the United States after being ordered deported
from the United States by an Immigration Judge commits a felony by
unlawfully reentering the United States without first securing the
authority of the appropriate government agency in seeking to return to
the United States.  For an alien who has no criminal convictions, such
an unlawful reentry carries a maximum penalty of 2 years in custody.  An
alien who has been convicted of certain crimes and felonies and then
unlawfully reenters the United States without authority faces a maximum
of 20 years in prison.

An alien who agrees to depart the United States, generally at his
(her) own expense, and then unlawfully reenters the United States is not
committing a felony by reentering illegally but will be subject to
removal as an illegal alien.

Clearly it is far easier to have an alien agree to depart from the
United States voluntarily but there is a world of difference between
these two scenarios.

The administration is obviously determined to create misleading
illusions to convince the citizens of our nation that they are meeting
public demands.

Lamar Smith, the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee has called
the administration out on the issue of the statistics provided about
the “removal” of aliens from our nation—making it clear that this
administration cannot be trusted to carry out its responsibilities to
actually secure our nation’s borders and actually enforce the
immigration laws that are supposed to protect our nation and our
citizens from the presence of aliens who are harmful to the safety,
security and wellbeing of our nation.

This administration is certainly not unique in using these tactics,
but has made the most concerted effort in memory to obfuscate these
issues.

Here is a link to a news report about the deceptive use of statistics
where the removal of illegal aliens from the United States is
concerned: http://libertynews.com/2011/10/19/ice-cooking-the-books/

Perhaps the time has come for the citizens of our nation to elect
someone like David Copperfield for President!  Then, at least, we will
have a professional illusionist in the Oval Office!