Cruelty is costly. You and I are paying the price.
It’s time to talk about women’s economics with attitude. It’s time to laugh at what is often absurd and call out what is dangerous. By focusing on voices not typically part of mainstream man-to-man economic discourse, Women Unscrewing Screwnomics will bring you news of hopeful and practical changes and celebrate an economy waged as life—not as war.
Remember the old days, when here in America, you were innocent until proven guilty? Right now, a presumption of war is entering every corner of our land of the free, from trade wars to bloody wars in Ukraine to Gaza, and political wars between Texas vs. California and Illinois about illegal threats of gerrymandering.
Reserve forces of the U.S. Army, 800 National Guardsmen, and (for some reason) 120 FBI agents, are being newly assigned by El Presidente to patrolling our national capital. He cites crime as his motive, which has dropped by a third in recent (Biden) years.
He’s done this kind of deployment already in Los Angeles for the last 60 days and predicts other cities are on his list: Baltimore, Chicago, Oakland and New York City—all places that just happen to vote blue and elect Democrats.
Governor “Newscum”—yes, that’s what our nation’s top executive at his Aug. 11 news conference, called the top executive of our biggest state economy, the fourth biggest economy in the world—just requested on Aug. 6 that the federal government “provide the total cost to taxpayers for this unlawful deployment of 5,000 soldiers.”
Early on, the Pentagon testified to Congress that it would spend, oh, just about $134 million for the LA deployment.
I’m just a mom—one of those “people that people come out of,” as Pete Hegseth’s pastor recently described us women—but it seems to me that this estimate low-balls the price of fixing three meals a day with groceries these days, as well as transporting and lodging 5,000 hungry young men.
A federal court is currently hearing arguments in the case of Newsom v. Trump, with the state’s attorneys presenting evidence that the LA deployment was unlawful. An amicus brief has been filed on behalf of a bipartisan group of 25 former governors, who alone once had the sole authority to deploy their state’s National Guard.
So, is this the “political theater” that Newsom claims? If it is, its cost is something Congress, the so-called People’s House, with control of the nation’s purse, should take into account. If it isn’t, they are still responsible for how our money is spent. This Congress in particular should be accountable for government efficiency—or as DOGE might put it, waste and abuse.
California’s economy is expected to contract later this year, thanks to cruel immigration raids and global tariffs affecting construction, hospitality and agriculture, according to a UCLA forecast. These are industries our whole nation depends on. Did I mention those grocery prices?
Deportations, mass arrests and the cost of detention are estimated to cost California alone $275 billion, along with lost tax revenue of another $23 billion. In 2022, so-called “illegals” alone paid $8.5 billion in state and local taxes. If they could work lawfully, that figure would rise significantly.
“Working lawfully” brings to my mind our nation’s first concentration camp, playfully named Alligator Alcatraz. It’s placed on an old airstrip in the Florida Everglades and is a sad example of federal/state cooperation.
The federal government will reportedly send prisoners, but the state and FEMA and the U.S. Park Service built it and collaborate to run it. So, what genius among this clique of spite thought it “efficient” to air-condition tents parked where humid summer temperatures range in the 90s? What is that cost?
We only have a reported annual budget of $450 million a year to hold its current 600 migrants. That’s about $7,500 a year for each prisoner, half the lowest U.S. prison system’s annual cost—so excuse me for doubting official numbers again.
This compares with sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell’s recent new country-club minimum security accommodations at federal prison Camp Bryan. It’s located on 37 acres in Texas that looks like a golf course and costs approximately $55,172.30 per prisoner per year.
Of the 600 migrants in Florida’s Alcatraz, two-thirds of them are without any criminal record, a Miami Herald investigation found. Florida’s current regime projects it will grow in future to hold 3,000 people. So, is it fair to assume we’ll be spending at least $1.25 billion annually on this one facility in future? Not for at least two weeks, it seems, as a judge just ordered construction there stop, while she considers environmental damage concerns.
Reportedly “substandard” and “inadequate” food is shipped into the place by tractor trailers, and now some prisoners are reportedly refusing to eat, due to worms and such. Multiple lawsuits have been filed concerning prisoner conditions like unconstitutional “cruel and unusual punishment” and their lack of access to their lawyers. There’s another federal lawsuit filed by environmental group that argues the state and its governor, Ron DeSantis, “has bulldozed over federal rules for assessing environmental harm within Big Cypress National Preserve.” where Alligator Alcatraz is located.
Oh, but then the earth does appear to be getting warmer. Alligator Alcatraz’s Everglade utilities, like power for running water, sewers and air conditioning, are provided by mobile equipment. I’m going to predict we’ll need to buy much bigger mobile power utilities and air conditioners soon, just to avoid killing people in our tents in our national park prison there. But maybe that’s this regime’s goal?
Which raises another cost of our cruelties. If you are as sick about this as I am, it’s hard to admit these cruelties are “ours,” so long as we’re paying with our tax dollars. What are the costs of the multiple lawsuits challenging our Justice Department for their administration’s unlawful behavior? Is this really what we want our government to be defending?
We know that the so-called Department of Homeland Security had a hole in its pocket leaking more money than it had—or possibly a hole in the head of its chief executive, the puppy killing, horse-riding Dakota cowboy, wearing a Rolex. She needed and got an historic appropriation of $165 billion in H.1, the Republican budget bill, and now expects to pay ICE and Border Patrol agents a $10,000 yearly bonus, thanks to this raise from a Republican-led Congress.
More prisons, more ICE officials, and more money for more lawsuits is needed to defend ICE-y Homeland cruelties.
After the midterms, this new ICE bonus expense will be partially paid by those who can least afford it: Medicaid patients and food stamp shoppers.
Do I need to remind you that women and mothers are a big portion of these folks? And that your local hospital and grocery store will feel the hit too? The rest of this big, not-so-beautiful bill will be financed by our growing national federal debt and a dollar that is losing value.
Thankfully, Lawfare reports that there are now 321 active cases challenging Trump administration actions. The New York Times is now tracking the lawsuits against this regime. Lawsuits have been a rising trend since Reagan, but the number of lawsuits in this administration’s first six months promises to set a new and unsettling record.
“Hundreds [of suits] have been filed by state attorneys and media organizations, physicians and nonprofits, migrants, international students, law firms and unions, concerning immigration, tariffs, birthright citizenship, funding cuts and the Alien Enemies Act, DOGE, Firings, Climate, Funding Cuts, Trans Rights, Access to federal property, and others,” according to The New York Times.
As a general rule, the U.S. legal system holds “The American Rule,” which says each party in a lawsuit typically pays their own attorney’s fees regardless of who wins. This intends to promise access to the law by ensuring everyone’s ability to pursue claims without fear of incurring significant costs from the opposing side. But what does it mean when you’re facing off with the richest and most powerful class that has bought our politicians?
What does it mean when I am rooting for “The American Rule’s” side that is suing my own government?
Great Job Rickey Gard Diamond & the Team @ Ms. Magazine Source link for sharing this story.
