Thursday, April 13, 2006

Send 'Em Home!!

Why is it a given that we cannot deport the 12 million or so illegal aliens in this country? Why can’t we? If we simply enforce laws already on the books, the illegals would have no choice but to go home!

Enforce laws against employing illegal aliens. With no jobs, most would find living here quite unpleasant. They’re here to make money to send back home. If there’s no money, there’s no reason to be here.

In addition, make citizenship a requirement for education, health care, housing, licensing of any sort, union membership, bank accounts, utility accounts, all the necessary parts of modern life. Sure, one can live ‘off the grid’ but there’s only so much room in the depths of the forest!

And when someone applies for any of the above and they’re illegal, not only are they denied what they’re applying for, they should be turned in to the police. These people are breaking the law! If the first thing they do in our country is to break several of our laws, why should we want them here in the first place???

And, of course, they do NOT vote in our elections!!

Please notice that all of the above refers to ILLEGAL aliens. Legal immigrants are wonderful. My great-grandparents were legal immigrants from Germany. I have no problem with someone who wants to come here, work hard and make a better life for themselves and their families! But do it LEGALLY!!

Don’t call me a ‘racist’. That’s a copout. If you have legitimate reasons for your differing opinions, please state them. The moment someone starts calling me names, I know I’ve won the argument. Townhall.com communist Mike Adams defines racism thusly:

Racism – is a pathological tendency to interject race into situations where it is not relevant, merely for personal gain.

Racist – one who interjects race into situations where it is not relevant, merely for personal gain.

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/mikeadams/2006/04/10/193113.html

I find it very hard to argue with that!!

The United States, as a country, has the right to decide who can and who cannot come here to live. Think of a country as a big club. There are membership requirements for any club be it the high school chess club, the PTA, the Elks, the Masons, Mensa, etc. These requirements do NOT make any of these organizations racist, elitist or evil. It means that one has to WANT to join more than one want the money required for dues or the time it takes to qualify for membership. Something you acquire easily and for free is generally worth the money and effort put into acquiring it. This is the best place to live on earth. Just ask all those Mexicans! It is only right to make entry dependent on something besides being able to sneak over the border.

As Americans, we’re very generous about letting in new members to our ‘club’. We accept huge numbers of legal immigrants every year, welcoming the peoples of the earth to come here, work hard, and make a better life.

Just don’t ask us to give away membership for free!!

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

We're from Microsoft and we're here to help!

I’m the lead IT professional for a small business here in the Cleveland area. It’s my job to assist users in their daily dealings with their Personal Computers, amongst other things. I also program in Access 2000, VBA, C#, SQL Server Reporting Services and do some network tweaking. Lots to handle.

I received a call from the “Helpful” people at Microsoft yesterday. She wanted to know what Microsoft could do to assist my small business with our software needs. I promptly suggested that they stop changing everything every time they released a new Operating System (OS).

“What do you mean by that?”

“Every time you release a new OS, you rearrange where everything is and how one accesses basic features. The productivity of my users decreases markedly for the next 6 months as they re-learn how to use their computers. This also applies to new versions of Office. Quit ‘rearranging the deck chairs’!!

“Your productivity goes down?”

“Yes! Most of my users are the sorts who only know ‘point here and double-click’. When you change the ‘here’, they be come very confused and it can take them months to adjust. That’s why we never upgraded to Windows XP and I am dreading the change to Vista. We will delay upgrading to Vista as long as we possibly can.”

She really didn’t seem to get my point. Microsoft’s propensity for making unnecessary changes to basic functions in their OS and Office products is the reason many small businesses and individual users have resisted upgrading to their most current products. I have a computer that runs Win XP only because that’s what my laptop came loaded with. If I’d been able to opt for Win 2000, I would have done so.

And now there’s Vista. From what little I’ve seen of it, it is once again a radical change, similar to the difference between Win 3.1 and Win 95 back in the 90s. My poor users at work will be totally lost!! Many of them are still running Win 98 on their home machines!

What really makes me mad is the arrogance exhibited by Microsoft. They just arbitrarily decided to change the way the whole world uses the Personal Computer. That’s how much respect they have for their users. Every new OS requires the relearning of where things are. They inconvenience everyone to their profit. How much money will be lost to this new OS in reduced productivity?? The small business I work for runs on a very tight margin. They cannot afford to have everyone take half again as long to do every computer task for 3 to 6 months as they relearn how to use their computers!!


I’d like to see businesses, large and small, get together and refuse to upgrade! If no one buys the product, maybe they will have to rethink their lack of respect for their customers. Of course, since new computers come with the OS pre-loaded, that will require the delaying the purchase of new computer equipment. Think the computer manufacturers will like that?? I’m betting not.