Author: R J Adams

For me, September of this year marks a decade of life in the United States of America. It’s not been a very comfortable experience. For ten long years I’ve been unable to precisely pin down what it is about this country that makes me nervous and uneasy.

On Sparrow Chat, I’ve written much about what I see as wrong in American society – the obsession with firearms, religion, and race; a lack of proper medical care for the disadvantaged; the sheer evil of out and out capitalism left to run rampant like some rabid beast loose among prey.

Perhaps I should have reached a conclusion a long time ago. After all, with hindsight, it was staring me in the face all the time. Maybe I just couldn’t – as the old saying goes – “see the wood for the trees”.

It took a simple segment on the CBS Evening News tonight to bring it all into focus. The answer was obvious.

Take a few moments to read the CBS transcript, entitled, “Life after deportation for U.S.-born children.”

(CBS News) TIJUANA, Mexico – The U.S. Border Patrol announced a new strategy Tuesday for catching illegal immigrants from Mexico: using improved intelligence to target repeat offenders.

These days, though, many Mexicans heading home outnumbers those coming to the U.S. Many of them had been deported, the result of stepped-up enforcement. CBS News correspondent Bill Whitaker reports what happens when families are forced to leave.

Every day Patricia Herrera walks her three children — 12-year-old Yasmin, 10-year-old Elizabeth, and 8-year-old Vicente — to school.

But these days, this familiar routine is on unfamiliar terrain. This family from Salt Lake City — these American children — have been uprooted to Tijuana, Mexico. These English-speaking children struggle to learn in Spanish.

“It’s different and it’s hard for me to understand what they’re saying here,” said one of the Herrera children.

Right across from the house they share with relatives is the fortified fence that marks the U.S. border. When Patricia was a baby, her mother sneaked her across. She grew up thinking she was a U.S citizen until she was stopped one day by federal agents. Caught a second time last October, she was deported. To keep her family intact, she brought her children — U.S. citizens — over in February.

“I was sad,” said one of the Herrera children.

“I was scared, I was shock, I was nervous,” said another.

Patricia Herrera said she is not adjusting well. “I never thought it would come to this, but it has. And it’s hard for them.”

Four years ago, Tijuana schools started seeing a steady flow of American students whose parents had been deported. When the U.S. economy fell into deeper recession, that flow became a flood. The schools are overwhelmed.

This school, Francisco Villa, is a prime example of what’s going on. Two years ago, there were no U.S. students enrolled. Last year, six enrolled; this year, 35. In all Tijuana schools, 2,000 students from the U.S. have enrolled so far this year.

Most feel trapped between two worlds. Cesar was born in Washington State. “I feel more American, he said, “because all my life I was over there.”

Jasleen was born in California. Whitaker asked her how is it different in Mexico than the U.S. “Like over there is cleaner,” she said. “Here, it’s kind of dangerous, like when it’s dark.”

Patricia can’t work because she can’t speak Spanish well enough. She studies every night with her children. She survives on money her family sends from Utah every week.

“I live right here on the borderline too,” she said. “And it’s hard to know that I look over there and [I say], ‘Oh, my God, if I could only get through there.’ But I know I can’t. So I have to accept and learn to live my life here.”

It’s a hard lesson many families from north of the border are having to learn.”^[1]

At first, you may think that segment (the video is available online) is about Patricia Herrera and her three children. It’s not. It’s about the United States of America. It’s all about what this nation has become.

Read the last paragraph again:

“It’s a hard lesson many families from north of the border are having to learn.”

‘A hard lesson’ – like maths, or Spanish?

There was no sympathy for the plight of Patricia and her kids in that report. Sure, it went through the motions, but the real point of the story was how well America was doing at getting rid of those it no longer wants. What it was really saying was, “Aren’t we suddenly so good at enforcing our immigration laws?”

And why not? After all, it’s what the majority of Americans have said they want to happen.

That one segment of a US evening news program clarified for me exactly what is missing throughout this country. It’s the reason for the fear-mongering that has persisted, and torn this nation apart for the last eleven years – since 9/11/2001. What’s missing from this country today can be summed up in one simple word:

Compassion.

There is no compassion in America today.

Oh, sure, you can all jump up and down and yell about how you did old Mrs Beidmeyer’s shopping for her, or, hey, what about those ‘Making A Difference’ segments on NBC News? Aren’t they about Americans being compassionate?

No, they’re not. They’re about Americans telling themselves how wonderful they are. They’re about ego-inflation. When the going gets a bit tough, you yell, “Look at us! We’re having it rough, yet we Americans are still wonderful people!”

No, you’re not. There’s not an ounce of compassion in you – unless it’s for yourselves. You’re very good at weeping, particularly when the news camera’s pointed in your direction. You wail and wallow when your kids get killed at the latest schoolhouse shooting, then go home and polish your AK47s.

You’d rather berate socialism, sneer at words like ‘welfare’, ‘benefits’, and ‘social medicine’ than help solve the problem of poverty in your own country.

“Let ’em die! They’re no good. Let them get a job and pay their way if they want a doctor. It’s what we had to do.”

Of course, it’s easy to forget your father paid your way through college and got you that fancy, well-paid, position with his company that provides you with generous medical insurance and a nice private pension when you retire. It’s easy to forget the guy across town – you know, the area you never go to because it’s a bit dodgy and people sometimes get mugged – he’s dying and can’t afford a doctor because he never had a father…yes, it’s easy to forget him, isn’t it?

America is deporting its own citizens to another country, with a language they don’t understand, just so you can tune into Rush Limbaugh and pretend to nod sagely while he rants on about illegal immigration and “what are we going to do about it?”

Patrica Herrera didn’t come to America illegally. She was smuggled in as a small baby. She believed she was a US citizen. Suddenly, out of the blue, a load of stiff-necks chuck her out on her ear to appease the Limbaugh’s of this great nation, or some hard-boiled politician who knows just how to whip up your ego until you have less regard for a fellow human being and her children than you have for a desert jack-rabbit.

There is no compassion in the United States of America. That’s what is wrong with this country. That’s why I’ve felt nervous and uneasy for the last ten years.

Where’s there’s no compassion, there’s no humanity.

And when a nation has no humanity, it has nothing.

^{[1] “Life after deportation for U.S.-born children” CBS News, May 8th 2012}

It may well be that the presidential election in France holds little interest for the self-absorbed American public. It is, however, of immense importance to all the people of the Western world, for the ousting of Sarkozy by Francois Hollande marks a turning point that will set the right-wing, capitalist, establishments shuddering.

Like the Egyptians of the ‘Arab Spring’, the French people have become the first to raise the cry, “Enough is enough!”, and kick their far right ‘President of Bling’ to the touchline.

Hollande is a true Socialist. He promises to be a rarity among politicians: a man more concerned with the needs of the people than the lining of his own bank account. Sarkozy, like so many of today’s politicians, sold out his country to US corporations, and his own ego.

The new French president rides a motor scooter and has returned to his home in the 15th Arondissment of Paris, at least for now, saying he intends to stay there, rather than the overly grand, official, presidential residence at the Elysee Palace.

Hollande has promised to withdraw French troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2012; reduce the share of nuclear power in France from 75% to 50%; raise the level of income tax to 75% for those earning over a million euros, and recruit 60,000 new teachers.

We must wait and see how he fulfills these, and other promises. But of more importance is the symbolic victory of the French people, who have made the first move in taking back their country from the right-wing establishment who milked it, and most of the Western world, for far too long.

Not just in France will those who sleep on the most luxurious mattresses, beneath sheets of finest silk, above soft, deep-piled carpets, do so a little less easily tonight.

How long is a roll of wallpaper?

As one who owned a professional painting and decorating business in the UK for a number of years, I can tell you the answer. It’s thirty-three feet, or 10.05 meters. It always was thirty-three feet, or 10.05 meters, and there’s no reason not to believe it always will be.

If you think I might be wrong, please check out the links at the foot of this page.^[1][2]

It’s important that a roll of wallpaper be thirty-three feet, or 10.05 meters, because that allows for at least three drops per roll on most walls, even if the pattern drop is 20 – 24 inches.

If a roll of wallpaper was, say, sixteen and a half feet long, and the pattern drop was twenty inches, even on an eight foot high wall only one drop of paper could be utilized, leaving a near useless length of around seven feet.

One drop to a roll! Ridiculous! No-one could entertain that. The waste would make it economically unviable.

On this side of the Atlantic, Americans agree. Thirty-three feet, or 10.05 meters, is the right length for a roll of wallpaper.

Well, actually two rolls of wallpaper – in one roll.

A roll of American wallpaper is sixteen and a half feet long (I kid you not!). But as sixteen and a half feet is useless for wallpapering, US wallpaper manufacturers combine one roll into two rolls, but on one roll, if you get my drift?

Don’t worry if you don’t. I didn’t for quite some time. The whole idea is so ridiculous the human brain doesn’t handle it well – until, you realize the reason why US wallpaper manufacturers have devised this convoluted system.

They charge twice as much. They sell a single roll of thirty-three feet as a ‘double’ roll, and charge you double for it. I guess that’s why it’s called a ‘double’ roll! Of course, they’d like you to believe you’re getting twice as much on your roll, but you’re not. Thirty-three feet has been an industry standard for wallpaper rolls for forty-odd years, to my knowledge.

Recently, I purchased eight rolls of wallpaper. The website of the Sherwin-Williams Company advertised the paper at “$22.49 a roll”. They also stated, “This wallpaper is packaged in two rolls. It is priced in single rolls.”

I ordered eight rolls, expecting to receive four packages of two rolls, shrink-wrapped together, each thirty-three feet long. What I received was four individual rolls thirty-three feet long – only half as much paper as I’d expected and needed, each costing, not $22.49 but $44.98. The label informed me these individual rolls were ‘double’ rolls of paper.

To proceed with my decorating I would have to purchase double the amount of paper I’d received, at double the price. Nearly $360.00 for eight rolls of wallpaper.

No wonder they call them ‘double’ rolls. This is an obvious case of ‘double-dealing’.

To perpetrate such a scam in the United Kingdom would never be tolerated.

But then, I guess that’s what marks the difference between the evil Socialism, and Capitalism.

^{[1] “Wallpapers Direct (UK)”}

^{[2] “Ask.com}

Postscript: Since writing this article, I’ve priced a similar wallpaper in the UK. It works out substantially cheaper to purchase in the UK and have it shipped, than to buy one’s wallpaper on High Street, USA.