Trump falsly thinks crime is going up in USA and down overseas. The opposite is more likely true.

I listened to the Sept. 10 2024 presidential debate on the radio. Donald Trump seems to have a strong hatred for immigrants. He didn't even differentiate legal from illegal immigrants during the debate. He made it sound like the immigrants are mostly criminals saying crime, in USA, is going up while crime overseas is going down implying that other countries are sending us their criminals. This statement was fact checked by the moderator.

Per capita crime rate, in USA, has been going down again since a post pandemic spike.

Meanwhile I, would guess, that it isn't true that crime has gone down overseas. In some countries, like Haiti, gangs and crime have been rampant; a reason why so many Haitian refugees are fleeing that country. For the most part, the refugees are trying to escape crime and other problems overseas.

Yes, it does seem like the situation is overwhelming. There are over 8 billion people, on this planet and I wouldn't be surprised if possibly billions of folks have the dream of living in America. Most of them can't even get to our borders, let alone get in.

Here's my take. Yes, population growth does bring it's challenges as well as its benefits.

I can see worrying that criminals and terrorists could slip by overwhelmed vetting processes at the borders. Yes, a legitimate worry, but I do keep hearing that per capita crime, among native born Americans, is higher than among immigrants.

There's the lack of affordable housing in much of USA and growing traffic on our roads. Yes, population growth does have consequences.

At the same time, population growth brings some benefits, such as new talent in our labor force and more customers for our businesses. There's growing vitality and population fueling our economy. How we handle the situation makes a big difference. I definitely side with Kamala Harris, more than Donald Trump. While both candidates seemed to be stumbling on the actual issues, Harris did talk about the need to build more housing. Yes, housing construction has lagged behind population growth, in USA, for many years.

Back when John McCain was running for president, his vice presidential pick, Sara Palin, was noted for the phrase "drill baby drill" for increasing domestic oil production. Now we need the phrase "build baby build" for housing construction.

Some folks might think those phrases are not politically correct as being sexist. Still, much of society thinks in sound bytes and we do need to build, or figure out how to use the residential space, we already have, more efficiently. Let's here it for more studio apartments within transit or biking distance to most of our destinations.

Big picture topics, like this, don't get discussed much in the debates and most people seem to focus on the optics more than the topics. I tend to think "big picture" topics as I listen on the radio so I am less aware of the optics.