Another ‘Bigly Beautiful Border Wall’ project has bit the dust. Like so many others who tried to be ‘Trumpier than Trump’ Tex-a$$ Gov. Greg Abbott declared that by golly since the federal government couldn’t get it done HIS state would do what Trump couldn’t. Build a border wall that would keep those “illegals” on the other side of the border. It turned out to be a tad more difficult (and costly) than Abbott anticipated and he and his GOP legislature has killed off the project.
This article from MSNBC explains why Abbott and his fellow GOPers hoped to end this boondoggle without attracting notice. Abbott made a ‘bigly deal about it when he declared his state could handle turning Trump’s dream of an impregnable wall into reality, at least along the Texas part. The linked article also notes how for years conservatives have talked up how essential it was to have a wall. Whether they succumbed to logic and reason (cheaper and more effective means of controlling the border) or economic realities (paying for the damned thing was way more expensive than they thought) they’ve given up.
Between the logistics of acquiring land because of lot of those who own land along the border wouldn’t just hand it over, and the costs of design and construction reality settled in. After years of effort and $3B (that’s billion with a B) not all that many miles of wall have been erected. I used that word for a reason because these asshats probably hope for some miracle political version of an ED drug that would create a long, strong border wall erection. Three billion dollars and only a relative handful of miles of construction got done. So much for vaunted conservative fiscal responsibility and efficient government. But now it’s over:
Four years after Gov. Greg Abbott announced Texas would be the first state to build its own border wall, lawmakers have quietly stopped funding the project, leaving only scattered segments covering a small fraction of the border.
That decision, made in the waning hours of this year’s legislative session, leaves the future of the state wall unclear. Just 8% of the 805 miles the state identified for construction is complete, which has cost taxpayers more than $3 billion to date. The Texas Tribune reported last year that the wall is full of gaps that migrants and smugglers can easily walk around and mostly concentrated on sprawling ranches in rural areas, where illegal border crossings are less likely to occur.
It amazes me conservatives put so much energy into this kind of thing. Tragically they get a lot more bang for their buck come election time from culture war stuff. One could argue a border wall is culture war stuff and be partially correct. The problem is it requires actually creating something tangible that people can walk up to and touch. Or see in pictures, although as we know there are lots of pictures of sections of border wall people climbing over them, or with holes in them or entrances/exits to tunnels under them. Or just crumbling and falling down. Or, as shown in the title pic going along for a short way then abruptly ending.
I think Abbott knew this year would be the end of his grand dream of doing what Trumpty couldn’t. However there’s an awful lot of egg on his and other GOPers faces and eating crow is not a fine dining experience either. So, as the linked article indicates they waited until the end of the session to finalize a budget that included ZERO money for their precious border wall. For now.
Someone should start a pool on the month and year when they will revive this nonsense but for now it’s dead in the water. A small victory but we should take them, and use them when we can to show why Democrats would be better off running things. THREE BILLION dollars were wasted on this. Not just for Texas voters but all of us some journalist needs to verify exactly how many miles of wall were built with that $3B. I’m guessing the cost per mile is in the tens of millions. What a f**king waste…
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“THREE BILLION dollars were wasted on this. Not just for Texas voters but all of us some journalist needs to verify exactly how many miles of wall were built with that $3B. I’m guessing the cost per mile is in the tens of millions.”
Let’s do some basic math, here.
Okay. According to the linked article, “Just 8% of the 805 miles the state identified for construction is complete,” that means a whopping 64.4 miles of “wall” has been built (let’s just round up to 65 miles for the sake of argument). Now, assuming the next part of that quoted article–“which has cost taxpayers more than $3 billion to date”–refers to the cost of the WHOLE project, then $3,000,000,000 divided by 805 miles would break down to a cost of $3,726,708 and a few cents per mile. (still a bit of a boondoggle price. If the $3 billion is how much was actually spent to build that meager 65 miles of “wall,” then we’re looking at a much more staggering $46,153,846 and a few cents per mile.
Math: As effective against MAGAts as a cross or garlic is against vampires. It’s just too bad that MAGAts aren’t as fictitious as vampires.