🌧️ Monsoon Musings: When Trade Wars Meet Telescopic Truths in Trump's Arizona | BUCKMASTER
How Tuesday's Buckmaster Show revealed the interconnected chaos of tariffs, scientific funding, and our cosmic insignificance
Based on the Buckmaster Show for 6/24/25, a daily radio show in Tucson, AZ, interviewing local newsmakers. Analysis and opinions are my own.
😽 Keepin’ It Simple Summary for Younger Readers
👧🏾✊🏾👦🏾
📻🌵 A radio show in Tucson 🎙️ brought together three smart people 🧠🧑🏫👨🏫 to explain how government decisions about trade taxes 📈(called tariffs) are making everything more expensive 💸 while potentially destroying jobs in Arizona's huge farming industry 👩🌾🌾.
Meanwhile, a scientist 🧑🔬 from the University of Arizona 🏫 talked about an amazing new telescope 🔭 in Chile 🇨🇱 that can photograph the entire sky 🌌 and discover millions of asteroids ☄️, but government budget cuts might hurt similar projects ✂️💵.
A financial expert calling from Alaska 🌨️ said markets are confused 📊🤔 and Social Security might run out of money 💰🚫 sooner than expected. The show happened on the day it rained ☔ for the first time this summer in Tucson 🌞, which was pretty cool timing since it traditionally marks the start of monsoon season 🌧️⏰.
🗝️ Takeaways
🌾 Arizona's agricultural trade generates $3+ billion and 12,000+ jobs—tariffs threaten this entire ecosystem
📈 Household costs could spike $2,000+ annually from tariff policies, with cars increasing $6,000 each
🚀 University of Arizona's space science brings millions to local economy while advancing cosmic understanding
📊 Social Security/Medicare cuts moved closer: 2032-33 instead of 2035-36, with 23% and 11% benefit reductions, respectively
🌍 Arizona's legal cross-border agricultural workforce model shows immigration solutions already exist
🔭 Vera Rubin Observatory will discover millions of new asteroids while potentially solving dark matter mysteries
💸 Federal science funding cuts threaten Arizona's $20 million+ space projects and economic innovation
Monsoon Musings: Trade Wars, Telescopes, and Truth in Trump's America
When the summer rains finally kiss Tucson's parched earth, it seems the universe conspires to deliver wisdom along with the water—and a healthy dose of economic reality
As the first precious drops of the 2025 monsoon blessed the Old Pueblo during Bill Buckmaster's Tuesday afternoon show (on Dia de San Juan!), listeners were treated to a triple threat of truth-telling that cut through the political fog like a telescope piercing the cosmos.
With agricultural economist Dr. George Frisvold dissecting the devastating impact of trade policy on agriculture, financial sage Shelly Fishman calling in from Alaska's crystalline clarity, and astrophysicist Dr. Erica Hamden illuminating our weird and wonderful universe, the show delivered a masterclass in interconnected intelligence.
The Tariff Trap: When Trade Wars Become Agricultural Apocalypse
Dr. George Frisvold from the University of Arizona's Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics delivered economic education that would make even the most ardent protectionist pause—if they were capable of listening to facts instead of feelings. Spoiler alert: they're not.
The numbers tell a story that MAGA economists seem incapable of grasping: Arizona's agricultural exports create over 7,000 jobs and contribute "over $2 billion in sales" to the state economy. Meanwhile, imports from Mexico through Nogales—those supposedly job-stealing foreign goods—actually "contributes nearly $1 billion to the Arizona economy and creates nearly 5,000 jobs."
Wait, you mean international trade creates jobs rather than destroys them? Someone should tell the Twitter economists.
Combined, this intricate trade tapestry weaves "over $3 billion in sales to Arizona's economy" and sustains "more than 12,000 jobs." But here's where the tariff tragedy becomes personal: these aren't abstract numbers—they're your neighbors, your family members, the people who stock your grocery stores and keep food on your table.
The cruel comedy of capitalism reveals itself in Frisvold's explanation: "Tariffs are basically sales taxes on imports. So things that we purchase will be more expensive." Farmers face higher costs for fertilizer, machinery, and chemicals while potentially losing export markets to retaliatory tariffs. It's economic masochism disguised as patriotic policy.
Because nothing says "America First" like making Americans pay more for everything while destroying their jobs. Galaxy brain economics right there.
Arizona's cotton dependency illustrates the global economy's reality: "Arizona exports at least 88% of its cotton." That's not a typo—Arizona ships nearly nine-tenths of its cotton crop overseas. When other countries impose retaliatory tariffs, Arizona cotton farmers not only lose profits but also their livelihoods.
Yuma's winter vegetable empire feeds continental North America, with "most leafy greens are coming from, almost all of them are coming from Yuma" during winter months. "That's where everybody in Canada gets their leafy greens too." Tariffs on this trade could have a catastrophic impact on food security across two nations.
The Human Cost of Trade Theater
Perhaps most poignantly, Frisvold highlighted the sophisticated commuter agricultural workforce that crosses daily from San Luis, Mexico, to work Yuma's fields. These aren't the strawman immigrants of political rhetoric but essential economic actors in a carefully orchestrated cross-border ballet: "a lot of the agricultural labor we live in San Luis, they get up before dawn, they cross the border into Yuma, work all day, and then go back. And they're going back and forth legally."
Imagine that—immigrants working legally, contributing to the economy, and going home every night. Almost like the immigration "crisis" is more about racism than reality.
Arizona's early adoption of E-Verify has created "this kind of more orderly, seasonal, verified legal system" with "the proportion of ag labor that's undocumented in Arizona is actually much lower than California, much lower than Florida and Georgia."
But here's the economic forecast that should terrify every working family: household costs could spike "more than $2,000 more than they otherwise would." Shoes and purses could jump "33%" in price, clothing "28%", and cars could increase by "about $6,000 per car."
Between March and April alone, fertilizer inflation hit "about 19%" while "farm machinery went about 4%. Trucks went up about 6%. Ag chemicals went up about 8%." When farmers operate on razor-thin margins, such increases spell serious trouble for food security and affordability.
But hey, at least we're showing those foreign countries who's boss by... making our own people poorer. Victory!
Market Musings from the Last Frontier: Reality Check from Alaska
Broadcasting from the breathtaking beauty of Haines, Alaska, financial analyst Shelly Fishman provided perspective as crisp as the 55-degree air surrounding him. Markets have been "aimless over the past couple of weeks" with the Dow up merely "about 1%" year-to-date while the S&P and Nasdaq managed "about 3%"—roughly half the typical annual trajectory.
The Federal Reserve chair's congressional testimony revealed the administration's inflationary anxieties about tariff policies, with Fishman noting: "what we're seeing from the Fed... when he said, look, is, you know, what we're seeing in the economy is strength, but what we're seeing in the future is the potential for inflation."
Translation: The people who actually understand economics are terrified of what the people who don't understand economics are about to do.
Meanwhile, Social Security and Medicare's doomsday clock ticks louder, with projected benefit cuts moving from 2035-36 to "2033, 2032." Social Security benefits could drop "about 23%" while Medicare falls "about 11%"—an entirely fixable problem lacking only political willpower.
As Fishman noted with characteristic understatement, "These are not difficult problems to fix. We know how to fix them... But the political will to do that is just lacking."
Because why solve problems when you can blame them on the other party for another election cycle?
Cosmic Contemplations: Dr. Erica Hamden's Universal Perspective
The show's crown jewel came via Dr. Erica Hamden, University of Arizona astrophysicist and author of "Weird Universe: Everything We Don't Know About Space and Why It's Important." Her infectious enthusiasm for the newly operational Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile provided a refreshing antidote to terrestrial troubles.
This $800 million marvel—"less than a billion dollars," as Hamden noted, making it "a bargain" compared to space telescopes—will photograph the entire sky every few days, tracking asteroids, stellar explosions, and cosmic changes with unprecedented precision.
Because while we're down here fighting over who gets to hurt whom, the universe continues being magnificent and mysterious.
The University of Arizona's astronomical achievements deserve celebration, with Hamden proudly noting: "The U of A has played a huge role in it. We cast the mirror... under the football stadium here at the U of A, and we also helped with a bunch of the detectors for the camera."
But here's where cosmic wonder meets earthly concern: "It's already found thousands of asteroids and we know of about a million asteroids in our solar system and by the time within a few years of this observatory we'll probably know about four million more asteroids."
Great, more cosmic objects that could potentially end civilization. As if we needed help with that.
Hamden's book emerged from her 200,000-follower social media presence, where she translates complex astrophysics into accessible wonder. Her central thesis challenges human assumptions: "our assumption is like, oh, this must be exactly like it is on earth... And it turns out, of course, that the sun is made of basically completely different stuff than what makes up most things on earth."
Most provocatively, when asked about the universe's weirdest aspect, Hamden declared: "I think so far I would say it's us actually... We're the weirdest part of the universe."
At least someone finally said it.
Despite knowing 6,000 exoplanets, Earth remains unique—every other world is, in Hamden's technical terminology, "awful." As she explained: "All of them are awful... Like you go there, even in a space suit, you're going to die right away."
The Funding Fight for Scientific Progress
The conversation touched on funding anxieties plaguing Arizona's space science community, echoing concerns raised by Planetary Science Institute's Dr. Amanda Hendricks about the Trump administration cuts. Hamden's work brings millions to Tucson:
"That's a $20 million project, and almost all of that money comes to the U of A. So, I think 16 out of that 20 million comes here, gets spent here, and is like injected into the local economy."
Funny how the same people who claim to care about jobs want to cut funding for the industries that actually create high-paying, innovative jobs.
The Indigenous Perspective: Resistance in the Monsoon Season
As a Chicano journalist covering this administration's assault on science, education, and economic justice, these conversations reveal the interconnected nature of oppression and resistance. The same worldview that sees immigrants as threats rather than essential workers also sees scientific research as expendable rather than invaluable.
The tariff policies devastating Arizona agriculture disproportionately harm communities of color, who make up the majority of agricultural workers. The cuts to scientific research threaten not only cosmic understanding but also economic opportunities for students from marginalized backgrounds who view STEM education as a pathway to prosperity.
This is what colonialism looks like in 2025: defunding Indigenous knowledge systems while simultaneously destroying the economic relationships that Indigenous and Mexican communities have maintained for generations.
When Dr. Frisvold describes the orderly cross-border agricultural system, he's describing a modern version of relationships that predate European colonization. The arbitrary lines drawn by colonial powers never erased the economic and cultural connections between communities separated by borders.
Conclusion: Finding Hope in Dark Times
Tuesday's show wove together terrestrial trade troubles and cosmic contemplations with characteristic wisdom, illustrating how human curiosity and economic interdependence span scales from soil to stars. As monsoon clouds gathered and delivered their first precious precipitation, listeners were reminded that knowledge, like water, flows across boundaries—whether between nations trading goods or galaxies sharing starlight.
But hope isn't passive optimism—it's active resistance. Every time we choose science over superstition, cooperation over competition, and truth over convenient lies, we push back against the forces trying to drag us toward ignorance and isolation.
In our weird universe, Arizona remains a crucial nexus where agricultural abundance meets astronomical advancement, where practical policy meets cosmic possibility. The question is whether we'll choose wisdom or willful ignorance.
Take Action: How You Can Resist
Support Local Agriculture: Buy from farmers’ markets and support policies that protect agricultural workers' rights
Advocate for Science Funding: Contact your representatives about maintaining NASA and NSF funding
Stay Informed: Subscribe to Three Sonorans Substack for continued analysis of how these policies affect our communities
Vote in Every Election: From school boards to Congress, your vote matters in protecting science and workers
Support Three Sonorans to keep this vital news and analysis coming—because in times like these, independent journalism isn't a luxury, it's survival.
What Do You Think?
As we navigate these challenging times, your voice matters in our community conversation:
How do you think Arizona's unique position as both an agricultural powerhouse and space science leader should influence our approach to federal policy?
What connections do you see between the fight for scientific funding and the struggle for workers' rights in our borderland communities?
Share your thoughts below and keep the conversation going. In a universe vast enough to humble our biggest egos yet small enough to make every human connection precious, perhaps the real weird thing isn't that we exist—it's that we exist together, and we can choose to build something better.
Have a scoop or a story you want us to follow up on? Send us a message!
