We're in the news again, yay. First, the stats: The US held 21.0% of the world's prisoners in 2015, even though the US represented only around 4.4 percent of the world's population in 2015. The Wikipedia site "Comparison of United States incarceration rate with other countries" has additional sobering stats. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_United_States_incarceration_rate_with_other_countries#:~:text=The%202021%20US%20incarceration%20rate,in%20adult%20facilities%20in%202015.     Highlights of Kamala's fox interview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbNxiLaY6I0   Alford plea (not "Alfred" plea): https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/alford_plea An Alford plea, also known as a "best-interests plea," registers a formal admission of guilt towards charges in criminal court while the defendant simultaneously expresses their innocence toward those same charges.(It) skips the full process of a criminal trial because the defendant agrees to accept all the ramifications of a guilty verdict (i.e. punishment).   Prisoners were left to their own devices during Hurricanes Milton, Florence, and Katrina: https://www.ncja.org/crimeandjusticenews/some-florida-jails-and-prisons-evacuated-ahead-of-milton-but-many-incarcerated-remained-in-storm-s   The number of inmates requesting gender affirming surgery every year is miniscule, according to Bureau of Prisons. There have been only two known surgeries approved via court action. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/16/us/politics/trump-prisons-transgender-care-harris.html   Trans folx are more likely to be a victim of a crime: https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/press/ncvs-trans-press-release/   Let's step outside of prison for a minute. The #1 most common gender affirming surgery in minors? Researchers found roughly 150 cases in which a minor received gender-affirming surgery in 2019. But of those cases, 146 — about 97% — were chest reduction surgeries performed on cisgender male youth, constituting gender-affirming care for conditions like gynecomastia (which can develop nearly half the time among those undergoing testosterone-dominant puberty). https://www.them.us/story/gender-affirming-surgery-vast-majority-cis-kids-study