US-70,Goldsboro,N.C.

Well......I just tend to believe that the accidents involving foreigners are what gets reported. Illegal immigration isna red hot topic right now. We have leaders and figures that really push narrstives based on their personal feelings towards a topic. Media at times, gets a little more hung up on pushing narratives. Because of our current state in society, the narrative will be that foreigners cause all these bad accidents. The reality to me isn't so much about where you come from, but moreso improper skills and training. It's next level easy to CDL. 3 weeks of school, 4 weeks with a trainer, and boom. You're out here running loads with a 4 wheeler mentality, which by the way, takes years to undo.

 

I can see your point. I dont agree with it. But i acknowledge the thinking you took to get there and acknowledge there are parts that are of merit. However i still disagree, from the perspective of me and many others who have the reverse opinion. Its not JUST the wrecks. Its a lot of little peices that add up to our own picture making us speak out. A few notable examples.

Until recently you would flat out be called a racist if you so much as LOOKED at a forigner funny, cancel culture is very much a thing so no one did out of fear of the mob that would decend. The fact many of us have seen with our own eyes and many who are dual langual have listened to these guys esentially be talked through training with no understanding of the material or english and be handed CDLs for simply yelling racist at the DMV. The blatent piss poor driveing by many many MANY forigners often due to basically zero training. The literally hundreds or thousands of schools that have been caught in recent years handing out CDLs like candy. The fact that the whole english language fight we are having now is even a thing. Blatent illegal activity from the same sources. The preferential treatment of many forigners in wrecks or when put oos (dont believe me? Look up the mass murderer in colorado as a prime example everyone knows about)

Its not us decideing all illegals or forginers or non white drivers are bad. Or ####ting on them for being diffrent or just speaking up because of the herd. And while yes there is some of that and id be a liar to deny it. The majority in my opinion is many of us who have seen this #### for YEARS, finally being fed up and no longer careing that it upsets people we are pointing out the obvious. Well pointing out what is to us obvious.

Are all forigners bad? No. Are all forigbers bad drivers? Also no. But due to the frankly lack luster policys of the last few admins and the absolute GLUT of piss poor trained forigners flooding the industry and the esentially total lack of oversight. Forginers are a giant gapeing hole and wound in the industry. So much so there is a reason NO ONE is suprised when its a forigner the same way as they are when they hear billy bob who has driven for 30 years does a dumb.

I could be wrong. I could be off base sure. But looking at it through the lense of my experince and memory, this is the picture i see. And many others also see and share the same picture.

 

I think those folks get called racist for other reasons. That's dialogue for another day, and a different environment. I'm moreso going to stick to the industry practices, to your point have gone one for several administrations, long before there was a larger influx of international labor. CDLs always have been handed out like candy. Chameleon carriers have always existed. If there wasn't an influx of foreigners, I'm not so sure any of those things would have even been brought to the forefront. I feel like the powers that be would turn a blind eye. In any event, I take your point, and we have somewhat different viewpoints....but as a man who got his license in 2010, I know for me, it was too easy, and mind you, I never drove a manual shift prior to trucking. The lumps I took personally the first 5 years, it showed how much I was lacking in training.

 

Fair point.

Now before i go on i think i am going to toe the line between politics and general stuff here. I THINK i can keep it mostly a-political outside of the bare minimum to make my point and keep this a non sandbox topic and that is my goal.......

but i do need to slightly touch on politics a small amount to make a cohesive point. If i do step over the line please feel free to delete this message mods. Im not trying to start a #### war just a discussion but nowadays this is the type of topic that tends to blow up into a ####fest fast and i would prefer to not get yelled at if and sadly likely when its taken in a negitive direction.

now that out of the way and as risk of going sliiiightly off topic to make my point. I will be honest i grew up with trucking. I am proudly a 5th generation trucker and 3rd generation owner op. I drove my first semi before i drove my first car and one of my first jobs was driving an antique semi with twin sticks for an uncle doing grain with farm tags at 13. I grew up helping work on cat motors helping change tires playing grease....well i was going to say monkey but a 5 year old changing a big rigs oil filter is more akain to a grease grimlin frankly.... and generally seeing every aspect of being a driver since i was old enough to string two brain cells together. So my view of trucking is badly skewed and likely a lot deeper in some ways compared to most who come into the industry.

But thats also why i get far more angry about how rapidly things have shifted for the worse then many. This is not something i did for desperation or because i needed a job or any of a hundred other usually good reasons to become a trucker. This is my familys legacy with literally generations of history and experince to draw on. So changes to it are far more obvious to me. And while yes there have always been shady companys, bad driver and so on, until recently many would be shut down in short order without a second chance.

Its really only since around the late g w bush and entire obama era that things went right into the toilet. And while i can point to events bush, obama, trump and biden all did that made things worse and a few that made it better.

The one consistant is that on average i see is that when forigners were allowed to flock here in droves with little to no vetting and basically no policeing. With multiple states giving them licenses without the barest minimum of standards checks. Forigners mind who often come here, many of who have literally never driven a vehicle this big or at these speeds ever. Which is then paired with little or no training and #### near no oversite compared to a citizen and many who give no ####s about our laws our rules or the harm they cause some like the florida Uturn driver who was LAUGHING at killing people. Things took a sharp nose dive even more then before.

frankly the enforcement that until very recently basically didnt exist for forigner drivers. With many who would skip town after a major wreck, wait a few months and be back behind the wheel using a fake new name until they got caught again. Sure there are other systemic issues. There are causes for these issues (i wont go into them as that WILL push this right into a sandbox topic) And those need to be addressed.

But to abuse a common metaphore, right now a lot of those issues honestly only range from bumps and bruses to cuts, even gun shot and stab wounds. Meanwhile the proliferation of H1B, illegal, and otherwise forigner drivers in the staggering numbers that have come here in. Paired with the literally decade of lacking enforcement is a gapeing chest wound with the organs exposed.

The other stuff is serious yes. But the one is the obvious main issue, and simply putting a bandaid on it and adressing the little wounds wont fix the problem. These drivers are often under or entirely untrained unqualified and unsafe on our roads to a degree that is sickening and in yet again staggering numbers. This is why so many of us are focused on them as the main issue with such a dim general view of them.

Its not that everything else is unimportant. Far from it. Its that the forigner issue is one of the biggest and also easiest solved issues and would stem the bleeding long enough to diagnose what the hell else is even wrong. And while i can not and will not speak for everyone. To many of us who have been here a very long time or grown up doing this. The diffrence over the last 30 years is massive and the issue to US at least is as obvious as obvious can be.

 

You went back nearly 30 years to say each administration contributed to the decline of the industry. Why is the foreigner thing so obvious? They didn't create the system. They merely took advantage of an already flawed system. I feel like so many of you have misplaced anger. I think you should be more angry at the system, and advocate for harder vetting of ALL drivers, as opposed to singling out foreigners. The big time emphasis on foreigners, to your earlier point, does make it appear prejudiced because there's so much talk about their nationality, and that's not necessarily the reason for these accidents.

Seemingly, when I think about it deeply, their are other issues that probably contributed to the decline of the industry. At one point, drug use was rampant in the industry. Driver coercion was an issue. Fatigued driving was a problem. I could make the argument that there are improvements in the trucking industry since I got started in 2010. You went as far back as Bush 2. You don't think the industry had a much longer stretch of decline?

Oh.....and those drivers like yourself who take pride in the industry.....they're getting out, and not necessarily getting replaced all that quickly...that's something nobody talks about all that much anymore. That dialogue has been replaced with foreigner obsession. It's not like my kids' generation is looking at truck driving with a lustful eye.

 

I think you entirely missed the point i was going for let me try again. First i didnt go back further because i either wasnt alive or still in diapers so my understanding is not as comprehensive let alone as accurate as someone who lived during those periods and i cant and wont speak with authority outside of generally known history dispite much of it being things i remimbered being discussed as i grew. Honestly it wasnt until i was 6 or 7 or around 30 years ago i started to have anything approaching an understanding of the world and firm memories, let alone trucking as an industry. But as an adult looking back, the experinces are valid. And it establishes that there was a pattern i personally can establish going back at least that far and the forigner drivers are the expection to the established pattern. It started late bush early obama but i think it really got bad around covid and especially under bidens lax enforcment.

Second i even said there were other issues. I just am trying to sidestep them for this specific discussion. Namely why we dislike forigners and instantly assume they are poor drivers. Mostly as many of the other issues and side facts i would need to dredge up often delve deep into politics such as the above biden comment, and the general forum is not the place for a deep political debate of that sort. Sadly because as is often the case it WILL start a political dick measureing contest since many will take anything i say bad against biden or trump or bush or blah blah as an excuse to cause a fight. And while that wont nessessarily be started between us that i am trying to avoid giving them ammo. That said trust me i agree there are deep issues and i could rant against many diffrent political "leaders".

Or rather dispite my reputation for....excentricities and general lack of decorum im doing my best to keep the tone civil to the point morons dont have the ammo to waltz in and destroy a good debate. I appoligize if it degrades my stance or ability to convey my meaning correctly but well bluntly. Im no word smith. I tend to say what i mean and mean what i say to the best of my abilitys....and that is not often the best approach nor a polite one and often opens up discussions to fights. Im trying to be a weeee bit more tactful and its not a skill i am good at and ends up with me as word salady.

Now back on subject. The reason i am so focused on the forigner debate and to pull you to the specific point i am trying to make as best i can. Safety. Safety vetting training and so on basically everything to do with being a good driver which for the sake of not doing a word salad best i can. ill simply call training from this point on.

There are issues with it across the board. But it is undeniable that in many cases as even you have acknowledged training is a massive issue. Forigners due to pertinant and extraneous issues alike. Often arent vetted to the same standard, i use the aformentioned example of english language being a hot point as a perfect example. If you cant read warnings or signs. Your ability to be safe is badly degraded. There is enough evidence that a large percentage of foringers give zero ####s about our laws and rules. And enough evidence that many were esentially handed a cdl and told good luck. This has caused an absolutely massive spike in accident wrecks and generally unsafe behaviour on the road in a very short period that blatently stands out far more then any other issues.

As to your point about drivers leaving. That is also a big contributeing factor to the issue. Namely its not a retention issue. Its a pay and quality of life issue and its been discussed to death. Frankly and as succinctly out as i can. a driver here on a H1B or an illegal ilegally given a cdl or hired and yes even drivers being given a second chance are beholden to their company and these companys know it and abuse it. This causes them to be less safe and contributes massivly to the issue. And is one example of the issues i try to avoid delveing into and one of the few i feel confident of sidestepping most of the politics for the general forum discussing.

Shadow carriers running illegally as #### and swapping numbers as fast as they can. Most american drivers wont work for these type of company as it can destroy YOUR life. A forigner is beholden and/or far less concerned because they can just leave or have no options. This contributes. And i could go on.

Right now forigners are the issue we want solved.first because it rips the blanket off and makes the other issues either non issues or far easier to solve later. If that is still coming off as bigioted then i dont know what else to say.

 

We can agree that safety is a priority. If safety is the priority, then that should be what we are talking about as opposed to one's nationality. Unsafe behavior is not limited to where one comes from. You alluded to that. Even if the feds get every foreigner of the road, unsafe behavior stil exists to a large degree. That's the conversation I'd prefer to have. You see truckers flying down steep mountains, drivers texting, speeding through construction zones, speeding in general....in fact, unlike most truckers, I'm not opposed to governors on trucks. It's an unpopular opinion but I don't care. It's my own. Seeing an 80k lb vehicle traveling at excessive speeds unnerves me for some reason. Instead of a focus on immigrants, let's talk about training. Let's talk about skills. Let's talk about adequate trip planning. These conversations feel like more of a witch hunt to fix the optics of the industry under the guise of safety.

 

These are Serbian names. There was a recent 60 Minutes episode (so I read, didn't watch it) about how SuperEgo is run by Serbs and constantly breaks the law. I'm not a Slavophobe, actually studied Russian when I was younger, but between the Russian / Serbian / Bulgarian et al. trucking companies out of Chicago and the Ukrainian draft dodgers driving next to me, I have developed an attitude of automatic suspicion when I see them on the road.

 

Welcome back, Bud A. It's been a minute since I seen you here last. How are the jackalopes treating you?

 

The jackalopes are enjoying the breezy weather in Wyoming today. I took a break from internet forums for a couple years because I felt like I was spending too much time on them. The other day I got mad at my job and came here for some advice. I have to say, I've missed you guys.