I originally started this post weeks ago, so the quotes are dated, but given the events in L.A., I thought I would revisit and finish it.
From CNN, “US Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced Saturday the agency and state law enforcement in Florida have arrested nearly 800 people over four days in a ‘massive, multi-agency immigration enforcement crackdown.’”
And this from The Palm Beach Post, “Diego breathed a sigh of relief after a federal judge’s ruling this week kept his Venezuelan family’s Temporary Protected Status in place, at least for now. So did his employer, a construction warehouse in South Florida. So did the restaurant where his wife is a cook. And so did an incalculable number of other companies that stood to lose employees across the state and the nation if the 350,000 Venezuelans covered by TPS lost their legal status and could no longer work. The loss of TPS, economists have warned, could tighten South Florida labor markets like a taut rope, especially in service-oriented industries such as construction, education, health care and hospitality. … The threats to revoke TPS come at a time when Florida is already facing a labor shortage, with 53 available workers for every 100 open jobs, according to data from the U.S Chamber of Commerce. An abrupt change would affect Florida’s economy and change the identity of neighborhoods across the state. In Florida, data from 2022 shows more than 95% of the TPS population had jobs and listed $3.2 billion in household income and $2.6 billion in buying power as consumers. They also paid $655 million in federal and state taxes, according to a study by the American Immigrant Coalition, a Miami nonprofit.”
And now the unrest in L.A., as ICE shifts away from arresting criminal immigrants to otherwise law-abiding undocumented individuals who came to the U.S. looking to improve their lives and the lives of their families, highlights the national problem.
Needless to say, I’m growing very, very impatient! Where are the consequences? Where is the economic collapse I’ve been expecting in Florida, in particular, and the country, more generally, brought about by deporting legal and illegal immigrants en masse? Look, I do not say this sarcastically as a means to poke fun at those [Democrats] who warned that messing with the illegal immigrant workforce would bring disaster as Americans keep chugging along, doing more complaining and pretending that the state of the country is bad, just not that bad — yet. Quite the contrary. I am eager and welcome an economic disaster. For as Carville said, “the economy, stupid.” A declining economy truly seems to be the only thing that will wake Americans up to the error of their catastrophic votes. Yet, nothing’s happening. Produce prices are not increasing. If anything, they are a bit lower. Medium avocados, for example, are on sale for $0.39 each at my local grocery store, although they are mostly imported and consequently less impacted by domestic labor forces. Bananas are $0.45 per pound, again, mostly imported. (I live near a major grocery chain, so who knows how much buying power they have that may be keeping prices in check.) Moreover, domestically sourced items, such as tomatoes of all sorts, exhibit price stabilization, essentially unchanged from last year or the year before. The same applies to nearly any other produce item that immigrants harvest in America’s fields; a partial list of Florida’s major produce items includes oranges, watermelons, strawberries, sweet corn, and bell peppers. In short, there appears to be no labor shortage driving up prices, as I would expect from undocumented workers being rounded up or encouraged to self-deport. Clearly, fruits and vegetables are not rotting in the fields as feared. What gives? Seriously?!?! How does all this turmoil in the workforce ultimately manifest as business as usual? Nothing ever changes! (One could reasonably argue this is the market adjusting as intended. If there are no price increase consequences, then that’s just how things shake out.) No wonder morons of America are being lulled into a false sense of security, this notion that whoever the president is, nothing really changes all that much. I suppose this is the insidious magic of Dictator Don: It’s all bluff and bluster, signifying nothing and amounting to even less. That is until The Don! brings down the hammer, at which point the collective outrage of Americans will be one giant shrug! Oh, well!
Again, I reiterate: What the f***?!?! What the f*** is taking the economy so long to crash? My stock portfolio has never been higher. How the f*** is that possible? How, despite all the tariff mess, the stock market blithely moves onward and upward? Why is inflation still moderating, if not declining? How is it that people remain so sanguine about the state of the nation despite everything unfolding across the country? At what point do f***tards of America realize that eventually The Don! will come for them and their rights? But people keep keeping-on with blindfolds — willfully.
Yet, Dictator Don’s immigration policy remains his strongest polling issue. What pushback he’s getting on any public opinion survey outlier shows only slight “discomfort” from people, and any time he’s underwater on the topic it’s on the margins at best, with all too many still willing to give The Don! the benefit of the doubt, allowing him more time — to destroy the country further before they wake up. Dare I say, this situation in L.A. only strengthens his hand. It galvanizes the MAGA moron hoard and other “moderate” “Independents,” who hide not-so-mild racism beneath their alignment with Dictator Don in the name of keeping “law and order.” Utterly oblivious to the realization that “law and order” will come for them eventually. Whatever! Welcome to stupid America.