Friday, July 16, 2021

Once Again, One More Time

Really? That strategy works? What was your first clue....? Really? And what authority does the "cable crowd" have? Maybe somebody else should have been listening? Seems to me to be a much more relevant question, and concern. I'm not sure all of these people are playing with a full deck. Still, they get to vote! Is this a great country, or what? People smarter than me, who knew how to pull it off? Just for starters... FIGHT THE REAL POWER! And in case you were still wondering: The short answer is: "No." The longer answer is: "Hell, no."

Abbott has not detailed how many miles of barrier the state plans to build — or exactly where. But to make that promise a reality, the governor’s first big hurdle is money. The state has set aside at least $250 million for the effort, Abbott said, and then solicited donations from the public. As of July 14, people have donated $829,000.

That would fund between 7 and 62 miles of barrier, based on the per-mile costs of the contracts initiated by the Trump administration, according to a Texas Tribune analysis. The contracts, which were put on hold by the Biden administration, ranged from $4 million to $34 million per mile for wall construction.

That's not even the hard part:

Unlike the border in California, Arizona or New Mexico, which largely is federal, or in some cases tribal, land, much of the Texas-Mexico border is privately owned, with some owners holding title to their property since the 1760s. Texas does own some land, such as state parks and wildlife preserves.

Both the Bush and Trump administrations faced legal and logistical challenges with building a border barrier in Texas.

According to a 2020 Government Accountability Office report, the Trump administration faced delays of 21 to 30 months to take over privately-owned land in South Texas. The report said comparable land acquisitions in other parts of the country took a year.

If Texas seeks to build on private land, “it’s going to be a slow and painful process,” said César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández, an immigration attorney and law professor at Ohio State University.

Another hurdle Abbott will most likely face is federal regulations aimed at protecting the environment, water quality and historic sites. The Trump administration waived many of those rules to speed up the wall construction, despite pushback from environmentalists.

The Biden administration isn’t likely to ignore those laws for Abbott’s wall project, said Scott Nicol, a McAllen-based environmental activist and author of a 2018 ACLU report analyzing the impacts of a border wall.

“Those are laws that protect Native American graves, there are laws that are meant to protect family farms,” Nicol said. “Abbott's going to have to comply with all those laws. Trump didn't. That right there is going to cause [Abbott] big headaches.”

The fact is, you can't build a solid, single border wall from Gulf to shining sea.  Ladders is one problem; gaps is the other.

Jenn Budd, a former Border Patrol agent, said that barriers or walls make it harder for migrants to cross the border, forcing them to seek help from smugglers connected to drug cartels whose job is to find ways around those barriers.

“Our deterrence policies, our fencing, our walls, just make it a little bit harder to woo cross, but it doesn't stop it,” she said. “And more than anything, it funnels migrants into places where [cartels] have more control.” 

Their man on our side. 

And the money people have donated (proving a fool and his 💰 are soon…)*? Where’s does that go when absolutely nothing happens? Isn’t there some fraud involved here?

Inquiring minds want to know!


*And the pitiful amount is so cute! As if they think they’re actually doing something! I weep for the vast ignorance of this country.

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