Born Where? Citizen or Not?

Lately, we see a lot of confusion and misinformation about the background and citizenship of various public figures.

For reference, here is a handy chart explaining the status of some well-known people.

Name Birthplace Heritage/Citizenship
Rafael Edward Cruz
aka Ted Cruz		 Canada Father was Cuban, mother was U.S. citizen. Rafael had dual U.S./Canadian citizenship, but gave up his Canadian citizenship in 2014.
Marco Rubio Florida U.S. Citizen (birthright)
Parents were Cuban immigrants, not citizens when Marco was born, but naturalized later
Abdul El-Sayed Michigan U.S. Citizen (birthright)
Father was Egyptian immigrant
Zohran Mamdani Uganda U.S. Citizen (naturalized)
Parents were of Indian descent.
Ilhan Omar Somali Democratic Republic U.S. Citizen (naturalized)
Melanija Knavs
aka Melania Trump		 Slovenia U.S. Citizen (naturalized)
Donald John Trump New York U.S. Citizen (birthright)
Mother was Scottish immigrant, father was son of German immigrants.
Usha Vance
née Chilukuri		 California U.S. Citizen (birthright)
Her parents were Indian immigrants.
Kashyap Patel
aka Kash Patel		 New York U.S. Citizen (birthright)
His parents were of Indian descent. Expelled from Uganda, they were asylum seekers who moved to Canada before coming to the U.S.
Pope Leo XIV
aka Robert Francis Prevost		 Illinois U.S. Citizen (birthright)
Peru (naturalized)
Vatican City
As a U.S. citizen, he can vote in U.S. elections.
Native Americans or indigenous people Tribal Nations and U.S. As of 2025, the federal government recognizes 574 Tribal Nations within the United States. In 1924, the United States unilaterally conferred United States citizenship on citizens of Tribal Nations. Since then, every Tribal citizen born within the boundaries of the United States is a United States citizen.
Elon Musk South Africa South Africa (birth)
Canada (birth)
U.S. (naturalized)
His mother was born in Canada.
Nicki Minaj
born Onika Tanya Maraj		 Trinidad and Tobago Research by Snopes and others indicates she is a legal permanent resident of the U.S., who may be pursuing a "golden visa" that would allow her to puchase citizenship for $1,000,000.
Mehmet Oz Ohio U.S. and Turkey
His parents were Turkish immigrants.


References:


Photo by Global Residence Index on Unsplash


 
on No comments:
Labels: , ,

Useless

I am reminded of the "bad boys" of my elementary school. These were the boys who made fart sounds with their armpits, belched loudly during quiet time, pushed kids at recess, defaced the walls with vulgar graffiti, came up with offensive presentations for "Show and Tell," and sat in the back making rude comments. They had a following (mostly each other), but most kids were tired of their antics and didn't like them. The teachers really didn't like them, and after the first week stopped giving them the benefit of the doubt or trying to reason with them. They had terrible grades. They weren't invited to birthday parties.

Why did they behave so badly when it made them unpopular and did not lead to material rewards? My theory is this: They were stupid and untalented, and they knew it. They craved attention, but couldn't get it through achievement. They would never win the science fair, never star in the school play, never get a citizenship award, never get academic honors, not even be appointed as hall monitor. The only way they could draw focus was by annoying, inconveniencing, and angering others. I guess that was enough to satisfy them.

We see that same pattern of behavior now with politicians who do nothing to benefit their constituents, but spend time doing stupid, destructive things, telling lies, insulting everyone they encounter, and just generally being horrible. They will never know what it feels like to achieve something worthwhile or to be sincerely admired by good people, but getting attention for being destructive, nasty and creepy makes them feel important.

Photo by Art Institute of Chicago on Unsplash


 
on No comments:
Labels: , ,

Not Found

When Google was new, people LOVED it. As a search engine, it delivered top-quality results. We found what we were looking for! Later, when it started putting paid results at the top, people were annoyed, but not too seriously bothered, because it wasn't hard to just scroll past the promoted listings and get to the real stuff. Over time, though, greed and a sincere contempt for the users have changed everything. Google search results are poor quality most of the time. Ads, ads, and AI-generated content.

It's not just Google. Any search site is usually terrible. At my grocery store's site, I search for a particular item. If they don't carry it, they don't give me a result that says, "Sorry, we don't have this." Instead, they just show me a bunch of other stuff, most of which isn't even related to the item I want. And if they do find my item, they randomly mix other things into the results, so I can't be sure I've really found the right thing. Amazon does this routinely.

There are quite a few Google search alternatives available now. Most of them brag about how they, unlike Google, don't track you or sell your data. They may or may not provide better search results. Most offer an AI option.

AI searching is problematic in many ways. Too many chatbots simply make things up, or are misled by fake websites and articles written by other AIs. I really don't know if there is a high-quality, reliable way to search the Internet any more, or even a good way to search the local supermarket.



Photo by Vitaly Gariev on Unsplash


 
on No comments:
Labels: , , ,

Gimme More

There are people who actually imagine that trump (and others like him) can't be bribed because "he's already rich." Somehow, they have failed to observe what is on display every day: the insatiable greed of the ultra-wealthy.

For a normal person, enough is enough. If I had, say, $100,000 in my bank account, and someone tried to tempt me into sin by offering another $1000, such a person would make no impression on me. I could afford to laugh at them. The normal person imagines that someone who already has everything neither needs nor wants more. In the popular imagination, money will tempt only people whose bank accounts are empty, who are facing bills they can't pay, who long for luxuries they've never been able to afford. In the real world, money tempts those who already have it. The guy who already owns a couple of yachts and a private jet will do unspeakable favors for someone who will give him yet another jet. The person who has billions burns with the desire to have trillions.

A famous quotation says, "Poverty exists not because we cannot feed the poor, but because we cannot satisfy the rich.” The wealthiest, the oligarchs, already have all their needs met. And if, through some quirk of circumstances, they find themselves wanting or needing something they don't already have, they can easily obtain it. They have more material possessions than they can possibly use. And yet, they want more. Further, it upsets them when people who aren't wealthy are allowed to have things. They don't feel rich enough unless everyone else is verge-of-death poor. Thus, we see men who have the means to end world hunger using their influence to take food away from impoverished families. We see men who are guaranteed to live in comfort for the rest of their lives, whose wealth could easily provide housing and medical care to entire nations, working to cut off other people's access to housing and medical care.

Again and again, research finds that poor people tend to be more generous than rich people. High-income individuals are more likely to shoplift, to cheat at games, to take candy from children, and to cheat on their taxes. While not every affluent industrialist is a miserly Scrooge, those at the top are, overall, less giving than the rest of us, more likely to deplore the very existence of other human beings, more likely to openly tout selfishness as a virtue.


"Eat the rich, and you feed your family for a day. Tax the rich, and you feed them for life."
   -- R.K. West


 
on No comments:
Labels: , , , , ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)