Some perspective on the size of the surge of refugee children

The far-right refers to the surge in unaccompanied refugee children from Central America as a “wave” and an “invasion.” Their political cartoonists, like Mike Ramirez from Investors Business Daily use gross distortion to propagate irrational fear.

Mother Jones recently reported, 70,000 Kids Will Show Up Alone at Our Border This Year. What Happens to Them?:

[Adrián] became one of the 38,833 unaccompanied minors apprehended by the Border Patrol in fiscal year 2013. That was a 59 percent jump from the year before, and a 142 percent increase from fiscal 2011; no one knows how many more kids avoided Border Patrol detection, or never got that far. This year, officials have told advocates they anticipate the numbers to double again, to as many as 74,000 unaccompanied children.

For some perspective, on any given Saturday this fall, this would be a disappointing sub-par attendance at the nation’s most prestigious college football programs. List of American football stadiums by capacity – Wikipedia:

1. Michigan Stadium, University of Michigan – 109, 900
2. Beaver Stadium, Penn State University – 106, 572
3. Kyle Field, Texas A&M – 106, 511
4. Ohio Stadium, Ohio State University – 104, 851
5. Neyland Stadium, University of Tennessee – 102, 445
6. Tiger Stadium, Louisiana State University – 102, 321
7. Bryant-Denny Stadium, University of Alabama – 101, 821
8. Darrell Royal – Texas Memorial Stadium, University of Texas – 100,119

It may be able to fill the University of Arizona’s Arizona Stadium (57, 803), and possibly Arizona State University’s Sun Devil Stadium (71, 706).

Get a grip, people.