Sometime this week, the Syracuse paper will run a story about me.

I suspect it will be a hatchet job.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think so.

Two months ago, I started doing a radio show in Syracuse, New York. I did not apply for the job, I was assigned it by the company that employs me and to which I am under contract.

At the time, the Syracuse newspaper had a reporter contact me and we had a very pleasant exchange. And he wrote a perfectly adequate story, it was gracious and accurate, and I was thankful.

Less than a month later, there came another message from the Syracuse newspaper. This was from another reporter, who wanted to do an "in-depth" story.

Which is where I got suspicious. Why, if you've just done a story on a new radio show in town, do you then immediately turn around and want to do another one?

I googled the reporter and his work. A quick perusal seemed to indicate that he loves adjectives and hates Republicans. He seems, in print and online, to have made great sport of mocking Sarah Palin, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney.

It was the typical smarmy stuff. Republicans are dumb, let’s make fun of them. That kind of stuff.

And he wanted to talk to me.

And I decided not to play.

Whatever dirt he’s dug up about me can run without me legitimizing it. Whatever game he’s going to play can go forward without me being a part of it.

I don’t accept this guy or his paper as a judge of me, my career or my life, and I don’t feel like answering his questions.

Now, maybe I’ve got him all wrong. Maybe his personal bias, expressed repeatedly in print, would not manifest itself in an article on me. Maybe the paper thinks I’m so fundamentally interesting that two stories in one month only makes sense. Maybe this isn’t a hatchet job.

But I’ll err on the side of leave me the hell alone.

If people want to know about me, I’ve got some 3,000 columns at my website. I’m on the air for seven hours a day, there are some few thousand more hours on iTunes and YouTube, and you don’t have to be a newspaper reporter to work Google. I have been employed in the public eye for almost 30 years, in different media and different states, and folks have had a pretty good chance to get the gist of who I am.

Maybe I’m just being prickly, maybe I’ve rudely shut this guy out, maybe I just want to be left alone.

Maybe I don’t like getting a new job and being treated like some three-eyed freak when I come to town. Maybe I’m tired of conservative ideas and people being derided and mocked. Maybe I don’t get paid enough to play the controversy game with my name and my career.

If this guy wants to trowel through my firings and my divorces and any number of skeletons in closets or out-of-context quotes and make some trouble, that’s his prerogative. But I don’t want to play. It’s my life and my choice and I’ll sit this one out.

In part because I’ve been on the front page of the paper before, in a way not many others have. I’ve been held up to public ridicule and denounced by people across the political spectrum. I’ve been betrayed by people I’ve gotten elected and backstabbed by people who smile to my face.

And I’ve had that play out in front my children, and seen the great and lingering upset it causes them.

So I choose not to play.

But I’m willing to restate what I’m doing in Syracuse. I’m following the direction of my employer, I’m trying to give WSYR an additional local show, I’m keeping faith with the people gracious enough to listen, and I’m giving my career one last swing for the fences.

My work situation has changed quite a bit in association with the start of the Syracuse show and the schedule change in Rochester. The impact on my personal and professional life has been significant. The new show is not coming easily or without cost. But I see the WSYR show as possibly my last chance to make the case to the radio industry that I am marketable and that I should get a look beyond the close confines of 585 and 315.

For me, professionally, it is pretty much now or never.

So I have a big incentive to make this show work. I intend to do that by focusing completely on listeners, being true to them and honoring the kindness they show me by tuning in.

Some have questioned whether the show is truly local. Most of the time it is broadcast from studios in Rochester. Hopefully it will also soon start being broadcast from a studio in my home. When I get into a routine, my expectation is to work from Syracuse a day or two a week. The goal is to bounce my work days between the two cities and still be able to eat dinner with my children one or two nights a week.

If that’s not good enough, then that’s too bad.

I can’t do much more about geography. But I can keep working on content. The Syracuse show is predominantly local each day, with at least half the content being exclusively Central New York. I recognize that I am a guest on the airwaves of Syracuse and in the lives of Central New York listeners and I am doing everything I can to be sensitive to and respectful of the culture and uniqueness of the region.

Would it be better if the Syracuse guy lived fulltime in Syracuse? You bet. But, as the suits say, that economic model doesn’t work. Until somebody ends the recession and brings a lot more money into the radio business, hosts are going to split their time between cities or there will be no local hosts whatsoever.

Anyway, that’s a tangent.

They’re doing a story on me in the Syracuse newspaper. It’s probably going to be a hatchet job. So I leave them to write it by themselves.

This isn’t about illegal immigration.

 Because nobody will do anything about illegal immigration.

 This is about guest workers.

 And somebody has to do something about guest workers.

 The odd political game that has built up around illegal immigration is of tremendous benefit to the political parties, but a treasonous disservice to the country. The parties get votes and donations, and the country gets the shaft.

 So forget illegal immigration.

 Focus on guest workers.

 We need them. They benefit us.

And we should quickly develop a system that lets them legally come here in sufficient numbers and in a flexible enough time frame to meet the labor needs of the United States.

I know, we’ve got aching unemployment. We’ve got a welfare society where cancerous proportions of our population sit idle and entitled. Fully 20 percent of the “income” in our nation comes from what most of us call welfare.

In a perfect world, America has more than enough labor for its needs. But this isn’t a perfect world, and we are so enmeshed in sloth and bad policy that, as a practical matter, the labor isn’t available.

And if we don’t change that, we’re going to go hungry.

Because the guest worker issue is about your belly, and keeping it filled.

The American farm needs a workable guest-worker program, not as a matter of convenience or profit, but of survival. This isn’t about theoretical policy issues, this is about the house being on fire and we’ve got to take action now.

Technology and science have done much to make agriculture wildly productive and efficient, but in many aspects of farming, it comes down to human hands doing hard work. Work for which in the American economy there simply aren’t enough workers. It doesn’t matter how much farmers pay, it doesn’t matter how much they advertise, beg and plead, there simply aren’t enough American workers willing, able or available to do the work.

That leads to the loss of crops, and an incentive for illegal immigration.

Because there are foreigners who will do the work. There are foreigners for whom the difficulty of farm labor is a happy price to pay for the wages.

In other countries, there are eager workers. In America, there are waiting wages. We’ve got work and they’ve got workers.

Right now, on the black market, that equation gets worked out. Illegal workers sneak north and both they and our society suffer. It is a situation truly beneficial to neither.

And it leaves the American farmer in a very difficult position. Knowingly or unknowingly using illegal labor, vagaries of supply and law enforcement leave farmers and the food they produce in a precarious situation.

Which needs to be fixed.

Whether you favor amnesty or deportation, no matter which side of illegal immigration you’re on, we need to fix the farm-labor problem.

There are cows to be milked, grapes to be pruned, apples to be picked and chickens to be butchered.

And to get those things done reliably, the Congress must create a program that allows orderly, quick, ample and legal movement of foreign workers into and out of the United States. There must be created a way for these workers and the farmers who employ them to honorably and legally get together and do what needs to be done.

Currently, the process is too small, too slow, too inflexible and too expensive. It does not work, and proof of that is the steady flow of illegals.

America can clearly craft a guest-worker system that allows foreign workers to come here to specific jobs or labor suppliers for a specified and limited amount of time. It can be done in such a way that prevents these workers from either being preyed upon or preying up American society, and in a way that doesn’t create a burden for taxpayers and social services.

This would bring legitimacy and reliability back to the agricultural labor force, and add stability and affordability to our food supply.

For too long, our failed immigration policies have fostered illegal immigration and all of its woes. They have also forced farmers into practices at odds with their values and our laws. A common-sense guest-worker program would end that.

Yes, there have been piecemeal efforts. Inexplicably, there has been opposition and only slow progress.

And that must change.

In this election year, when candidates are forced to take positions and make promises, this must be a priority. No more excuses can be accepted. The solvable guest-worker problem must be separated from the currently insolvable illegal-immigration problem.

There are farm jobs here, and willing workers there, and we are a foolish nation if we cannot figure out how to legally and efficiently get them together.

It looks like Common Cause and common sense won out.

The word percolating through political circles Friday was that, as the clock winds down on congressional redistricting in New York, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has decided to throw his support to district lines proposed by the good-government group Common Cause.

From the standpoint of Western and Central New York, that’s a very good thing.

And it hasn’t come a minute too soon.

While most states finalized congressional-district lines months ago, and already see fully active congressional campaigns, the New York process has been dead – mired in political deadlock and an apparent effort to run out the clock. By delaying the process, political bosses benefit incumbents and the parties’ favored candidates.

But the window is about to close.

Primary candidates begin passing petitions a month from now, and a process to accommodate military and absentee voters for the June 26 primary is about to kick in.

And, officially, there has been no word whatsoever about district boundaries.

If the governor has, in fact, decided to back the Common Cause lines, he will have proven true to his pledge of supporting a politics-free process. He will also have moved this process to completion.

So let’s presume the rumors are right, and let’s see what they mean for Western and Central New York.

First, the two Buffalo members of Congress become true Buffalo members of Congress. They focus exclusively on Western New York. And the odd ear-muff district linking Buffalo and Rochester – gerrymandered to create a black district, but hijacked by the undying ambition of Louise Slaughter – goes away.

The 22nd District represented by Tom Reed becomes a true Southern Tier district, though it sadly separates Allegany and Steuben Counties. Nonetheless, its run along the Pennsylvania border from Steuben to Delaware counties, picking up Corning, Elmira and Binghamton and extending north into the southern Finger Lakes.

The Common Cause objective was to unite “communities of interest,” and to create congressional districts where the people had things in common. The group seems to have been very successful in that regard, and the Western and Central New York districts illustrate that very well.

Especially in the new 26th District. Centered in Rochester and including most of Monroe County, this district is a dream come true for this region. No longer oddly carved up into districts anchored in Buffalo, Corning and Syracuse, New York’s third-largest metropolitan area would finally have its own seat in Congress, and that’s great news for Democrats and Republicans alike.

The 26th includes all of Monroe County except Hamlin, Wheatland, Rush and Mendon.

The 24th District is a new creation which looks strange on paper, but ends up making pretty good sense. It stretches from west of Rochester to east of Syracuse, sweeping through the Finger Lakes and picking up the great orchard regions along Lake Ontario. This district is very conservative and very agricultural.

The 23rd District matches Syracuse and the Mohawk Valley, tying the Salt City to Utica and Rome instead of Wayne and Monroe counties. From an economic and historical context, that makes sense.

So those are the seats. Here are the politics.

Tom Reed needs to take his boundless energies and direct them eastward into new territory and show those folks why he is regarded as an excellent young congressman.

That’s the easy one.

Monroe County’s not so clear cut.

Incumbent Louise Slaughter hasn’t really said whether or not she’s going to run, but she is 82, and there are other Democrats who think they’ve sat on the bench long enough. I wouldn’t be surprised if of her own volition or at the suggestion of others she decides to call it a career and not run.

Because if she does run, she won’t win.

At least I wouldn’t expect her to.

The fire breather in Monroe County is County Executive Maggie Brooks, who has money, organization, experience and a county quite happy to vote for her.

Maggie Brooks is a congressional candidate in waiting, and the moment the balloon goes up she will be in a dead sprint.

Though she might not be unopposed.

Gates Supervisor Mark Assini, a rock-ribbed conservative and former congressional candidate, has the fire in the belly and the backbone necessary to go against Maggie. Where he will be at a disadvantage is in money and organization.

In the 24th District, the long Finger Lakes and farm district, there is no incumbent.

But David Bellavia lives there, and David Bellavia was born to be in Congress. One of the most-decorated veterans of the Iraq War, David Bellavia is an effective national spokesman for veterans, patriotic and conservative issues. Rudely handled by Republican Party bosses in two previous runs, Bellavia has been a gentleman and respected the process – and the party owes him.

And his values are an exact fit for this district.

Though there could be a fly in the ointment.

And that’s because of the Syracuse-Utica-Rome district. That district has two incumbents – Ann Marie Buerkle and Richard Hanna. Both are Republicans, though he is a liberal Republican and she is a conservative Republican.

That district is turf mostly represented currently by Hanna, whereas the new 24th includes a fair amount of territory Buerkle represents.

I asked Ann Marie Buerkle on Friday if she would primary Hanna. I also asked her if she would move into the 24th and run there. She didn’t say yes or no to either, but she did say she would run.

It should be noted that the Constitution only requires a member of the House to live in the state which contains a district, not in the district itself. So though almost all members of Congress live in their districts, they don’t have to, and Ann Marie Buerkle wouldn’t actually have to move if she chose to run in the 24th.

All of which is background to the question: Could there be a showdown between David Bellavia and Ann Marie Buerkle for the Republican nomination in the 24th?

Could be.

But I sure hope not.

Personally, I love, admire and respect both of these wonderful Americans. In my perfect world, Buerkle defeats that RINO Hanna in a primary and then goes on to win the district, sending both her and Bellavia – two true constitutionally based conservatives – to Congress.

But the Syracuse-Rome-Utica district is going to be more liberal than the 24th, and it is going to have a strong Democrat campaigner in former Congressman Dan Maffei. Probably Dan Maffei feels very good about his chances in this district, and with good cause.

What that means for Buerkle, and if and where she runs, is for her to decide.

As a conservative, if these districts become official, the news is good. Our regions’ varied interests are far better served by these new alignments, and the party scorecard turns out just about the same.

Reed, a moderate to conservative Republican, keeps his seat. Louise goes away. Either Maggie, a moderate Republican, or Assini, a conservative Republican, go to Congress. One of two constitutional conservatives – Bellavia or Buerkle – get to advance the essential interests of our agricultural heart, and if we get lucky Buerkle defeats Hanna and Maffei for a net philosophical gain. If we don’t get lucky, Maffei wins. But even with that, the balance stays the same as it is now, and all we’ve done is trade in a fake Republican – Hanna – for a real Democrat – Maffei.

So that’s the buzz, and that’s what it means.