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USRebuilding will be painful. (Credit: Josh Edelson//AFP via Getty Images)
The fire still engulfing large swaths of Los Angeles has done more than destroy homes, businesses, and livelihoods. It has scorched the whole dream of Los Angeles, part of a downward spiral unfolding for a generation — and cast into severe doubt the city’s ability to host the 2028 Olympics.
Fires have been a reality in California for at least 20 million years. In my own, far shorter lifetime, I have seen numerous blazes, and covered several on television. They aren’t predictable, but you know when they are likely to occur. They aren’t preventable, but you can be prepared for them. Fires, floods, and earthquakes — disasters are us, and that has been the case as LA grew over the past century.
This time around, city and state leaders bear a heavy blame for a shocking lack of preparation, given weather conditions that were well predicted and have caused disasters in the past. As Traci Park, a member of the City Council, recently suggested, the fires revealed “chronic underinvestment in our critical infrastructure”. Perhaps the most remarkable failure was the lack of pressure to get water out of hydrants.
This disaster reflects the failure of the one-party progressivism currently dominating governmental structures. In this worldview, basic infrastructure is less important than addressing climate change and “social justice”; measures such as building dams or hardening the electric grid are demoted to a secondary role, with catastrophic effects.
While the fire may not reverse this mentality, it has demolished the reputations of two major adherents: LA Mayor Karen Bass and California Gov. Gavin Newsom. Even as federal authorities warned of fires, Bass elected to take a junket to Ghana at the behest of President Biden. She came back to a city ablaze, with thousands of Angelinos having lost their homes and businesses.
During her tenure, Bass, whose political icon was Fidel Castro, had cut the fire department budget, signed off on lavish, and largely unsuccessful, programmes to address homelessness, and crowed about how the city would defend illegal immigrants. Meanwhile, everything in the city — from parks to schools — is worn and in a state of ill repair.
Nor has this regime done much for its poorer residents, which it claims to care most about. LA suffers among the highest poverty rates in the state and the worst in the country. South-central LA, the epicentre of two of the worst riots in American history, is now poorer in relation to the rest of the city than before those upheavals. It remains the second worst homeless capital of America and builds far fewer new housing per capita than almost every other large US metro area. The city still wants to raise taxes amid a deepening budget hole .
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SubscribeThere’s something uncomfortably ironic about wealthy residents who’ve continued to vote for the progressive schtick asking why their mansion is going up in flames whilst the water in the hydrants that might’ve saved it doesn’t flow due to political neglect.
Once the flames have died down and the dust settled, is it possible they’ll begin the task – every bit as painful as watching their treasured possessions left in smoking ruins – of rethinking their attitudes to local governance, and life in general? As Bob Dylan might’ve sang: the answer is blowing in the Santa Ana wind.
The chickens of virtue-signalling what Rob Henderson coined “luxury beliefs” are finally coming home to roost in Los Angeles.
Joel Kotkin is talking out of two sides of his mouth.
He has been perpetually espousing the benefits of suburban living instead of hip urbanites .
Now when the most desirable suburban location in the world; the public schools there are so good the rich did not go private; is burned to the ground he tilts his opinion ?
Does that not spell opportunist fakery.
The capacity for conservative self deception is real and hurtful.
And to wait for a natural disaster to wag fingers of onesided blame, while the fires still rage. Very much of an opportunistic cheap shot. Would he treat disasters in Florida with the same sanctimonious high hand?
The capacity for progressive self-deception is infinite.
Many of the homeowners affected are not wealthy
I don’t doubt it, but my point regards those who are.
The point is that this time around, some are wealthy. This doesn’t often happen.
Malibu and Palisades not wealthy? Guess again. Even Altadena has high median house prices.
The desperation of media to show Altadena as a worse tragedy than Palisades is dreadful. The higher ratio of African Americans in Altadena drives the media pity for dome but not others. Not many low income people in Altadena or any place in LA north of downtown. Fire is yellow, orange, fed. These are the colors that count in the fire “conversation”.
So they won’t have recourse to law. Will a lawyer who ‘believes in the justice of their cause: come forward and ‘work for free’ for them?
I doubt it. As much as the policies make things worse, southern California was always monument to human short sightedness. Twenty million people move into a desert that’s also one of the most active earthquake zones in the inhabited portions of the world and complain that there’s not enough water, too many wildfires, and housing is hideously expensive. Why do they do it? Oh, because the weather is nice. Given that marvelous display of rational decision making, is it reasonable to expect intelligent and sensible public policy? Seems like a case of stupid is as stupid does to me.
Putting aside poverty, poor education, and kindness, I guess we could say the same about trailer-park tornado victims in your home state of Kentucky. But that would also be a bad look.
The cause of these fires is as yet unknown, but will likely prove to be a so-called Act of God. In any case, this is the worst wildfire event in the (recorded) history of LA. None of us are perfectly safe, and even if someone’s house is built on a cliff, a fault line, or in a tornado alley I think we should forbear to mock them, at least until the dust has settled and the death toll is known.
*You recently commented, not without some justice, that it was in poor taste to publish a disparaging article about Jean Le Pen right after his death, one that seemed prepared ahead of time. Even if many of the points were factual.
There are many instances of death and disaster that are aided by human shortsightedness, including stupidity. I think we should aim for a more charitable view, especially considering the ongoing, wider spread of the smoke, literal and figurative. There are poorer people and children living in exposed areas. They don’t have the same level of choice as multimillionaires, and are not mere children of fools and ghouls or whatever. I also think we should shouldn’t jeer at people who’ve lost their homes and belongings, not even numbskulls or rich pricks. At least not right away.
Please excuse my using your comment, in part, to address this article and the response here in a more general way. Have a good Sunday.
We actually don’t have that many tornadoes here. Other parts of Kenrltuvky Tornadoes are a truly unpredictable phenomenon and a low probability event in most places. In places where they are common enough to warrant taking measures, I suspect smart people do and stupid people don’t. I wouldn’t live in a mobile home in Kansas.
We do have idiots here who build houses or park their mobile homes within fifty yards of a river or in what we call the bottoms which roughly translates to ‘swamp’. When they wonder why they can’t buy flood insurance I regularly mock their stupidity as well. It’s not like I am singling out Californians or any specific person. There’s nowhere that doesn’t have its fair share of idiots. I would venture that in California just as here the risk is not equal in all locations and sensible people and insurance adjusters probably can tell which houses and areas practically scream fire risk or flood zone. Every area has its issues and homeowners and governments should take measures to prevent reasonably predictable events. The whole point of the article is how the entire area has collectively failed to do that and the government is utterly clueless and has their priorities all wrong.
Perhaps it was in poor taste. Still, there is a difference between snide comments from users and a published article. There are different levels of formality and different audiences. There are also different standards in terms of accuracy and decency. I don’t mean to belittle any individual’s personal loss. I really just wanted to take a shot at the judgement of celebrities and affluent Californians who seem to fail at basic logic.
Every place does have risks but they are by no means equal. Some places are riskier than others and some things should be foreseeable by any sensible person. Things like the desert is dry and there’s not a lot of water should be obvious. There’s also the people buying land and building near the coast knowing that sea levels are rising and of course they’ll want “disaster relief” twenty or thirty years down the road. If it happens, remember that I told you so. I just have limited sympathy for people who fail to plan for reasonably foreseeable events.
A reasonable response. I accept that you are more of an “equal opportunity mocker” than I gave you credit for. I try to be too, and to cut down on sarcasm and mockery over time, with slow and uneven success. Your point about the difference between a comment and an article is well taken. Still, your lengthy apology for Le Pen and energy for mocking perceived idiots in a catastrophe both seem well below the level of comment I expect from you, as a rule.
Sometimes you seem to take a charitable or sympathetic view, sometimes not, in a way that I don’t think is strictly connected to facts or to reason. Not that I’m a model of consistency. With a nod to Whitman: We are large. We contain multitudes.
And smallnesses too.
I didn’t think of it as an apology for Le Pen so much as a criticism of the article itself, which I found to be basically an attack on populism in general disguised as a character assassination of an easy target held up by a string of guilt by association claims. The point of the article was essentially to use an easy target who is easy to criticize and worthy of great criticism as a scapegoat to avoid addressing the substance of opposing viewpoints. In other words, it was yet another media commentator who simply dismisses the populist movement by calling them all racists, which makes no sense for such a large movement. Surely some of them are racists and surely most are not, which could be said of most groups. It’s just bad journalism.
Based on your valid criticism, I’m thinking perhaps this piece isn’t much better, and I missed it on account of my preexisting biases, which I freely declare. People who choose where to live based on superficial reasons without considering potential perils are a pet peeve of mine. It comes from my father, who was exceptionally cautious when searching for homes to avoid such obvious pitfalls and scrutinized small details to avoid future expenses and problems.
Further, I’ll admit my comments are often dependent upon whatever mood I happen to be in. If you think its bad now you wouldn’t want to know me twenty five or thirty years ago. I also tend to mirror the style of the article. Its a habit I attribute to my instinct to just reflexively imitate things. Most of my better responses are probably from articles by Harrington, Stock, Fazi, or Unherd’s other regular writers. Your quote from Whitman is well taken. None of us should think too highly of ourselves. Humility is a virtue that is lacking in our society and though I try to remain humble, I have my faults.
I respect all of that. Thanks for the thoughtful reply. I’m not gonna give myself a humility prize anytime soon either—a self-award would invalidate it anyway. Another thing with me is that I am very moody and oversensitive to some criticism. There are days on which I shouldn’t post at all (some here might say that’s any day). Unfortunately, I sometimes post up a storm on such days. Like you, I’ve improved over the decades in many respects. With tons of room for more improvement.
There is a difference between
A. Victims of an act of God
B. Delusional, arrogant people who have voted for ridiculous policies (DEI, progressiveness, “environment”), and are paying the price for that .
Nobody here is wishing harm on those in group B. Just pointing out that this should be a point to self reflect on their life choices.
Pretending that a massive catastrophe of a kind (if not scale) that have always occurred here in California is due entirely, or even mostly, to the policies of your sociopolitical enemies is shortsighted, if not an outright cynical piling-on. I understand that there is limited sympathy for people of great wealth, over-importance, and hubris—at least when they are political opponents.
But did people who voted for Trump vote for a mishandled pandemic, or was that the people who voted for Biden? There’s surely blame to go around while we’re playing the blame game. What about the Texans who supported privatizing the energy grid: Did they vote to freeze to death in 2021 when the system failed? Some on the Left might say so, with a smirk to boot. That’s some ghoulish bullshit.
I accept that your simple A-B division has some validity. For most here. But a sizable number of well-liked commenters can’t be bothered to conceal their vindictive glee: “You voted wrong, you deserve to burn”. It’s almost that bad in certain instances here.
The notion that all catastrophes have political architects and deserving victims we can easily discern has become a sickness on both extremes of our overwrought divides. And the extremes are leaking into what remains of the center. We all need to cool it.
“Pretending that a massive catastrophe of a kind (if not scale) that have always occurred here in California is due entirely, or even mostly, to the policies of your sociopolitical enemies is shortsighted,”
Except that we are not pretending.
Unless you think there would be negligible difference to the outcome if the democrats elected by the victims of the fire, had not put in place unqualified DEI hires in charge, cut back the fire department budget, sent equipment to Ukraine, let water reservoirs run dry, and ignored measures to reduce fire spread.
Those specific outcomes would have differed. But I absolutely think Republicans would have mismanaged the environment and preparation, as they have when they have been in charge. In particular, anything that needs revenue or tax tends to get ignored, and Big Ag would be quite sure to get away with even more water waste than it does now. The fire departments would likely be even less numerous, with plenty of old guys who were once qualified in their ranks.
Note that these are likelihoods, not ironclad certainties.
Don’t mistake me for a defender of the status quo, nor a fan of progressive management. I am trying to get people, you included, to stop making everything, including Acts of God, into a political game. However certain you are that your team is better and stronger. I don’t think you can look at the way mega-disasters are managed in red states and point to anything like perfection, or even clear, consistent superiority to Democrats.
Please restore the distinction between correlation and causation. Don’t draw hasty conclusions, and don’t do a staged victory lap while fires are still burning. Try to avoid using your considerable intelligence to come damn near pre-determined conclusions that fall into a fixed left-of-centre bad, right-of-centre good framework. These are my requests.
“absolutely think Republicans would have mismanaged ”
Placing blame for grotesque mismanagement that led to massive human suffering- Demrats and their voters – isn’t a “political game”
Trying to shift responsibility from those responsible, using reprehensible, vague arguments like the above, definitely is.
You make a sub-minimal attempt to understand or even be civil toward those whom you disagree with. Seems like half the world is thrown into your basket of reprehensibles, and I am painted by you as some combination of stupid (another thread) and evil. You are full of self-certainty and contempt. Is that something you’re proud of?
Of course you are engaging in cherry-picking and gamification, as your term for Democrats amply indicates. Is the Party of Trump well-managed? Of the two, which party at least makes a better show of concern for the air, water, and soil? Which is likelier to let big business run rampant, or cut taxes for essential services? Do you condemn the failures of Republicans with the same self-righteous zeal?
Don’t answer right away, just think about it. You really need to let some air into your head (don’t worry, you’ll can return to an airtight black-and-white game board after a little break). But I’m not holding my breath for that.
Who privatized the energy grid in Texas, which contributed to over 200 deaths from freezing in 2021?
Which president led the response to Katrina, and told the FEMA director: “Brownie, you’re doin’ a heck of a job“?
How did president Trump handle the pandemic? What is constructive about the way he has responded to California wildfires in the recent past, and what he is saying now?
They’ve quarantined my response for whatever reason. Perhaps some of it will land when it posts. Doubtful tho. We’re doing little more than talking past one another at this point.*Posted (at least for now). I’ve made several attempts, over a long period of time, to get you to admit nuance or complexity and take a more fairminded stance on a variety of issues You’ve barely budged—though I know you can and occasionally do. You seem like a tribal zealot in the main, polemical and onesided. Maybe you do have a deep understanding of life and politics in California, where I’ve lived for about 45 of my 53 years. (Don’t hold it against me). But I’m not picking up on it. Kind of like if I tried to school you on why Viktor Orban, whom you support, is bad for Hungary, where I think you’re from. It’d be nice if you used your directness and intelligence in a less warlike or closed-off way more often.
Anyway, that’s all. Have a good week and wish us well here in California if you have it in you.
No pol will advocate a 50 percent cut in population for LA County. No pol will support a ban on new residential construction. No pol will support eradication of all housing in canyons or steep hills. Let it all burn.
Cheaper than futile fire fighting
No-one in this debate has as yet mentioned Stewart Resnick. Owner of a Californian ‘farm’ running to 180,000 acres; 121,000 acres of it irrigated by the state’s water. As of 2018, Resnick’s crops used more water in a year than the total of Los Angeles’ homes. See Stewart Resnick: Land, Nuts and Water Made America’s Biggest Farmer at https://watercalculator.org/.
Indeed who controls the water rights
The King of California: J.G. Boswell and the Making of A Secret American EmpireMark Arax (Author) Rick Wartzman (Author)
Excellent point. One would think now would be a good time to question the wisdom of funneling a large share of a drought prone area’s water resources toward farming water intensive crops. How did this even happen.
Because people can get rich doing it, increasingly on a huge, Big Ag scale. Of course greed, shortsightedness, and plain old stupidity are not the exclusive properties of any one party, state, or perspective.
Indeed they are not. Greed has long since overwhelmed common sense in so many areas. The rise of the greatest and most powerful totalitarian state ever to exist was facilitated by the greed of western corporations and investors. It is the hidden demon lurking behind so many modern problems.
We can definitely agree on that.
Bob Dylan is rich and Progressive ?
Your logic is befuddling !
Two things are literally laughable in this tragedy taking place at ground zero of the Idiocracy. The first is blaming climate change on wild fires in that part of the state. The second is the mayor. Watching her on camera is simply painful.
But don’t worry, in less than two weeks the same people will start blaming Trump for the fires.
For goodness sake! It is far more important that the existential threat of Trumpism is fought than worrying about a few bonfires and water supplies and things.
This has, it would seem, been the priority since 2015 in LA.
You are quite mad. I do not mean angry
Learn to recognize and appreciate irony. He even spells it out conveniently by his last sentence..
He is being ironic.
The inability of some people to recognise irony is astounding.
You cannot educate stupid.
Oh dear, someone is not going to be comfortable in their head for the next 4 years, MAGA, looking forward to it, time for the snowflakes to melt away.
I hope everyone has seen the video where Governor Gavin Newscum arrives in state at a fire-ravaged neighborhood and steps from a black limousine for a photo opportunity. As he alights in sunglasses and a muscle shirt, glossy hair slicked back, Gavin looks more glamorous than any modern film star. “Governor, governor,” a woman cries running to him, “we need help.” He says he is on the phone right that minute with President Biden. “Can I listen?” she implores. It turns out Gavin was telling a little fib because all the cell phone towers were down. Someone, maybe his wife, must have told him his look conveyed the wrong message and subsequent photo ops showed him decked out in a ball cap and shirt in Elmer Fudd style.
Someone in the Trump team is blaming the Ukrainians for LA’s catastrophe. “We spent too much money on helping the Ukrainians”, you see.
Everyone spends too much on helping Ukraine!
According to an article at Free Press, which is definitely not pro-Trump, L.A. sent its “surplus” firefighting equipment to Ukraine last year.
They already have, they said his anti global warming stance caused the winds to blow harder.
Trump, the fire starting flamethrower (figuratively speaking), is as guilty of politicizing this ongoing disaster as anyone. And that is fueling some of the glee-infused mockery on this comment board.
I agree that it is silly to blame climate developments for the whole catastrophe. But it is willfully blind to dismiss the influence of severe drought and rising average temperature—whatever their genesis.
It’s all a refusal to live in the real world. The left/media are blaming “climate change”. No need to look at the neglect of boring infrastructure or forest management. Same thing happened in Canada with the Jasper forest fire.
Committees must convene in Sacramento, studies and reports written and printed in thick bureaucratic prose until people lose this damned sense of urgency and things can get back to normal wokeness.
True, but they do need to wait for the anti-Trump special session to end.
The recurrent mantra of modern technocratic governments is “we’re the experts, don’t question us”. It’s when things go this badly wrong that you realise it is essential that you always question the experts, because they might not be as smart as they claim.
The Bonfire of Gavin Newsom’s vanity. I hope that is lying in smoking, irretrievable ruin and that at last he finds some humility.
I’m terribly sorry for the tragic loss of life and the horrendous loss of homes and the suffering of thousands because of the collective political hubris and incompetence he inspired.
Thank you for this, Mrs R. It’s heartening to see someone able to hold the complexity of the situation — acknowledging not only political folly, but also the very real pain of the people whose homes and lives have been devastated by this event. As an evacuee waiting to find out if my house survived and if any of the dead are people I know and love, I am grateful to you.
The LA fire chief is a lesbian as is the assistant fire chief. When questioned whether women were strong enough to carry a man out of a burning building, the latter said maybe he shouldn’t have been there in the first place.
Western cities, like LA, have become so fixated on virtue-signalling over faux climate change that they’ve abandoned the core basics needed to protect their communities. The devastating fires in LA—taking lives and destroying homes, schools, and businesses—are a tragic reminder of this misplaced focus. My heart goes out to all who have suffered, but it’s impossible to ignore the catastrophic failure to prepare for a scenario that history has repeatedly warned us about.
This “perfect storm” of fires didn’t come out of nowhere. Much of this destruction could have been mitigated with proper preparation and foresight. Instead, essential planning and fire readiness were left to rot while priorities were funnelled into political posturing. This wasn’t just a lack of action—it was a despicable disregard for the very people cities are meant to protect. Will we finally learn the lessons history keeps screaming at us, or will we keep paying the price?
To cite a “lack of preparation” or “lack of investment misses the point. This is not a case of making mistakes; it’s a case of a state refusing to deploy proper preventive measures. The state actively prevents controlled burns by subjecting such proposals to an instance environmental impact review that drags on interminably. The state actively nurtures its growing vagrant and homeless community which is notorious for setting fires. The state actively chooses to divert water for the sake of a bait fish no one could identify by sight.
The malicious truth is that people there are living out the consequences of their policy and electoral choices. This is California; pushing Newsom out could very well usher in someone even worse. And Gavin will continue being mentioned as a 2028 presidential candidate.
It would be nice to imagine this catastrophe as a catalyst to reorder the governance of ultra progressive California. Unfortunately, it is not only the upper echelons of leadership that have brought the Golden State to such ruin. Over many decades state and local governments there have been purged of mid and lower level “civil servants” that did not conform to progressive ideals. More competent public foot soldiers were replaced by DEI hires. Education, transportation, utilities, judicial, and public safety departments are now staffed by politically-correct-thinking incompetents, who are often corrupt to boot. These legions of fools are isolated from the ballot box and protected by generous employment contracts with unions and liberal judges to enforce them. They aren’t going anywhere and won’t be swept out by the results of an election, no matter how tectonic the voter shift. This phenomenon should temper the enthusiasm of all conservatives or centrists who are optimistic that the recent national elections will soon translate into significant change in the status quo or that voter dissatisfaction with Newsome, Bass, et al will usher in a new era of responsible and efficient government. It’s the reason Trump’s advisors concocted the idea of DOGE, whose effectiveness at the national level is far from a sure thing despite Musk’s involvement. Hope is a slender stem for so heavy a flower.
Hope may be the sine qua non of large-scale human endurance, achievement, and improvement. Not pessimism or nihilism in the guise of realism. That hope needn’t be naive or hyper-optimistic, but it’s indispensable.
There’s been no purge on anything like the scale you claim. San Diego is relatively conservative. San Francisco took a turn toward the center. More than 70% of the state electorate approved increased penalties for so-called quality of life crimes. There are several Republican Congressman from California (9 out of 52, an admitted imbalance) and off the coast and in smaller towns the people and institutions lean right. (Not most school boards). And some recent history, including the long governorship of Arnold Schwarzenegger, suggests that a return to more center-right influence and power is a realistic prospect.
I apologize for disturbing your dreams.
I invite you to return to the blame filled nightmare of your current worldview. Or not. Your free American choice.
I don’t think it’s rainbows and puppies and cheesecake in the sky to hope for a less mean and angry nation. Instead of fueling it, after the example of the fire-starting blame-thrower about to take office again.
Let it burn. The leadership that the author has criticized is who the people have voted for and will continue to vote for. Until the pain is deep enough nothing will change,
Yup, gooder and harder.
“Clearly, a new more pragmatic mindset, not necessarily a conservative one, is desperately needed”
Pragmatic = conservative. Let’s keep what works, let’s keep what’s good. That’s the definition. As opposed to let’s put the things on the margins at the center, let’s prioritize new untested idealized things.
I’m sure you needed to say this so that those whose minds have been captured by the left will here you though. That mind hears conservative and can only think about Nazis (national socialists), fascists, or those who are race obsessed.
You sound well-captured yourself. You can’t even envision any positive side to liberalism, nor acknowledge the more common failings of a conservative perspective: rigidity, nostalgia, hardness of heart. It needn’t run to the extremes you cite as a smokescreen.
Conservatism is no exact synonym for pragmatism, nor does it hold a monopoly on what’s pragmatic or correct. To deny the need for some consideration for both innovation & risk as well as caution & tradition is to be captured by a onesided fiction, and be well on the way toward becoming a zealot or an extremist. The attitudes symbolized by left/right or liberal/conservative conflict always will and ought to be in dynamic tension. Some willingness to cooperate and compromise is called for: from the vocal center, on high, and by conscience and sense themselves. No utterly onesided approach can settle in for long with anything but horrible results.
It is interesting the attitude generally towards the victims of the fires worldwide. Glee would best describe it. Could we not for once feel sympathy for the idle, vain and undeserving rich who inhabit the areas worst affected by fire. Their contribution to culture, an example being a hotel heiress who increased her fortune by filming herself in delecto, is unparalleled over the last hundred years. Whether gorging themselves and becoming fat or injecting themselves to lose weight these poppycocks lead popular culture. Give them a break.
Nicely done. I see the list of those who’ve lost their homes and feel different levels of sympathy.. The rewards of schadenfreude are double-edged, so we should be careful of enjoying them too greedily.
Thanks AJ Mac. I agree that victims of any tragedy deserve sympathy and support, particularly those on lower incomes and those less able to manage adversity.
Amen.
“Clearly, a new more pragmatic mindset, not necessarily a conservative one, is desperately needed.”
This is like saying “clearly, a new square peg, not necessarily a round one, is desperately needed for this round hole”.
The Golden State’s ascendency was a product of a state that the great liberal economist John Kenneth Galbraith in 1971 described as run by “a proud, competent civil service”. This legacy reached its zenith not under California Gov. Ronald Reagan, as some conservatives might wish, but under the responsible liberal regime of Jerry Brown, building excellent roads, addressing state water needs, and fostering what Galbraith hailed as among “the best school systems in the country”.
.
It is incurable. The author still tries to convict us that modern liberals can do something good.
Pat Brown, not Jerry (his son), was instrumental in the development of CA into what it was at its zenith. Pat Brown was a liberal in the traditional sense, he was not a progressive, what the left tries to protray as the historical left. Jerry, his idiot son and also governor (twice), was known as Gov Moonbeam, a complete progressive whackjob who dated Linda Rondstat and lived in an apartment instead of the governor’s mansion while destroying the financial stability of the state through massive mandated handouts to the teachers and state fire/police union retirement plans, which many cities followed suite to the point of bankruptcy. That is one of his many crowning achievements.
But, he was elected twice, and not concurrently, so CA got what they voted for. I was there for his first reign, left just before his second.
One has to wonder if power infrastructure for charging cars is a major factor in places like LA burning down.
No. The fires are seasonal and have been occuring for thousands of years.
Generally people try to mitigate fires around their houses.
The plot thickens. And now it appears electrical substations are the source of some of the fires.
I guess you meet your fate on the road you choose to avoid it.
Joel- You should know that “Experts” such as Envira Mintal-Justice an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the Academy for Democratic Liberation say that criticism of Progressive causes ignores nuance and spreads harmful misinformation. It distracts from the indisputable fact that until the Capitalist system is abolished, the Earth will continue to rage with righteous anger.
Harmful, misplaced tropes about progressive governance in service of a divisive culture war won’t satiate the Earth’s anger.
We need to have a teach-in to protest all of this toxic and deplorable neo-colonialism. It’s problematic because it causes harm to marginalized communities, and there’s a lot to unpack here.
Please invite the Governor, the Mayor, Greta Thunberg, Titania McGrath, and AOC. (Assuming the fires spared French Laundry. Otherwise, the nearest Whole Foods.)
“When we get ready to take the United States, we will not take it under the label of communism, we will not take it under the label of socialism, these labels are unpleasant to the American people, and have been speared too much. We will take the United States under labels we have made very lovable; we will take it under liberalism, under progressivism, under democracy. But, take it, we will.”
Alexander Trachtenberg at the National Convention of Communist Parties in 1944
The perhaps most inexcusable aspect is the lack of emergency preparedness in the broader sense. I heard from multiple friends – some of whom lost their homes, others who were luckier – that the evacuation orders sent thousands of people scrambling into chaos. No proper evacuation routes, no guidance beyond “get out now”, no traffic control. Random individuals delayed their own escape to guide traffic for their fellow evacuees. For this, there is no excuse. Winds or no winds, as the author notes, fires are a constant in this state and they could at least have developed a smooth emergency management plan with emphasis on evacuations and routes to shelters. Look the photos of staff desperately rushing people in wheelchairs out of the danger zone. And what about the people who, stuck in gridlocked traffic, had to abandon their cars and flee on foot — very dangerous, and difficult for the physically handicapped or with small children and pets, and compounding the tragedy by obliging them to leave behind even the few possessions they were able to pack up. For this there is NO EXCUSE. They think they can handle climate change and they can’t even plan for a predictable evacuation.
And, of course, leaving their abandoned car on the road instead of driving it into the nearest yard or ditch to leave the way clear for fire engines.
I think their electric car batteries ran out! Seriously!
The irony of wealthy individuals—living in this area and then turning to GoFundMe to ask for donations is both bizarre and embarrassing. I think this trend is eroding America’s empathy in many ways, which is dangerous on its own—when empathy is lost, it becomes very easy for society to spiral out of control.
At this point, people are assuming that these disasters—whether terrorism, fires, or natural catastrophes—are psyops by the government. This perception, whether extreme or unintended, reflects the erosion of trust and the failure to make people feel safe. The sight of fire hydrants without water, for example, is so outrageous that it understandably fuels these beliefs.
It’s difficult for people to grasp that basic necessities like water, infrastructure, healthcare, energy, and other essentials are controlled by just a few individuals. It doesn’t make sense that a country as educated and wealthy as the United States would operate this way. Honestly, we may need to admit that, as a society, we have failed in some fundamental ways—there’s no other way to describe this chronic underinvestment for literally our own people!
Excellent comment. The readiness with which we now blame one another on revved-up political or regional—during disasters!—is telling. Evidence of our unwillingness to band together and “err” on the side of good will when it counts most. Big generalizations, but not unfounded I don’t think.
Let’s all just pray that a “Big One” doesn’t strike while the present bunch are in power.
If Nero formed a political party he couldnt have made a better mess than Newsom has made of California.
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Pat Brown, not his idiot son Jerry. Both were governors, one was a classic liberal, the other a progressive lunatic.
Excellent points. Time to rethink business as usual.
Slowly but surely the white affluent liberals are starting the wake up.
I am reminded of Hayek’s dictum that 3,000 bureaucrats cannot outperform 20 million consumers. They just don’t have the bandwidth.
Reading about the wildfires, I am struck by the enormous numbers of variables, from water reservoirs to fire departments to evacuation procedures to undergrowth management.
The fact is that government just cannot imagine all this, let alone coordinate it. Government only knows how to fight racists with DEI and give out jobs to BIPOCs and boast about it on social media. That is all.
After the Great Fire of London in 1666 Wren planned to rebuild the City with wide Paris style boulevards but all the Londoners objected. They all claimed their RIGHT to whatever square foot of ground they had owned and had a building on BEFORE the conflagration,and they got it. Thus the City of London was rebuilt to the ancient street plan and that is why you can wander the ancient lanes and alleys to this day and feel the psychogeography. And they didn’t have super accurate digital satellite mapping back then. Yet now when there is one of these devastating fires there seems to be a presumption,in the public discourse at least,that any prior ownership of the land has been removed and it’s open to ‘development ‘ or ‘reconstruction’ by the lights of Black Rock. I don’t know the situation in Mauii following the fires there. I’ve read and heard words spoken by the ‘authorities’ about rebuilding that seems free of any idea of the land being owned,as of the fire has removed any previous claim,yet we have accurate satellite mapping now. There was a serious outbreak of SOCIAL UNREST in Rwanda 30 years ago and now a lot of land in that African country is owned by white Western men. Because as a Tory MP explained in chilling words,”social unrest creates investment opportunities”. USA citizens are famously litigious so maybe taking their plots of land wont be so easy. We will find out.
Hold the 2028 Games in Texas.
LA cant have people in the Hills.
Homeowners are to blame also. There is no right to over build on hillsides near semi arid land. Even without climate change, the City should have stopped residential construction outside the downtown and SW corners of LA well before 2000.
Homeowners trust their govt and development process before buying a property. Are you suggesting everybody hires a structural or civil engineer to do investigation before buying a property?
What is the point of government?
Possibly there is no point in certain forms of government.
You don’t need the Government to tell you not to buy or build a house in a desert.
Have you seen the world? People Live in desert for millennia. This issue is not about the nature gone wrong, it is about our own stupidity of not having decent infrastructure and principal policy. We have money for any war, but building basic structure for our society is like pulling teeth!
You get what you vote for
Agreed. And if we look at the devastation and ill preparedness with a list of the worst natural disasters this century, we can see that this isn’t confined to the management or policies of either party, or specific regions ruled by Progressive Elites.
Not to negate your point, or rescind my agreement: I will note that mankind has been subject to huge death tolls from natural occurrences and human behavior across those same millennia. If, heaven forfend, an Earthquake like 1906–estimated at 7.9 on the Richter scale—were to hit SF today, I doubt the death toll and fire damage would be anything like it was then. Same with the fire of London in 1666. Ditto Vesuvius. Just throwing in a longer view and keeping in mind there’s nothing we can do to prevent many disasters, or eliminate the death and destruction they cause.
There are certain places where you really ought not build or own a house, whatever assurances anyone, in the private or public sector, gives you.
Any Australian home-owner will know this. Or ought to.
And yet the wealthy are geared up to aquire burned out land and build back bigger than ever. It’s a fire sale!
I’m not here to claim that California, where I live, is well-run. But rising global temperatures and severe drought conditions—whatever their cause, in whatever proportion—play a major role, apart from any mismanagement. We shouldn’t rush to judgment, let alone mock suffering people as deserving victims—people that most of us don’t know, even if we think we do.
Let’s all hope that something good emerges from the ashes of this severe disaster, which likely would have overwhelmed any fire department and thwarted any preparation. And may we resist the lure of schadenfreude, whether against Hollywood, the super-rich, progressive elites, or whomever.
Droughts in California are unchanged, if one believes the statistics onstead of the narrative. Same with sealevels.
“Climate change” is the excuse of our age for governments to hide failure and corruption behind. That some people still believe an unsupported narrative makes climate change a mental health crisis.
Many use climate change as a catch all excuse or panic button strategy. That doesn’t mean it’s all fiction. Since you didn’t mention it, I guess you acknowledge that average global temperatures have risen, quickly and dangerously. Sea levels have risen about 10 inches (25 cm) since 1880 as the polar ice caps continue to melt, at an accelerating pace. Some Pacific islands have been nearly obliterated and others are under severe threat of being drowned. Where’s the data that enables you to deny this?
I’m not even saying all or even most of these real changes are caused by human activity. Perhaps little of it is. That part shouldn’t matter much. But we still need to face what’s happening and respond in some major way. Both those who say “We’re doomed, now change all your habits” and those who reply “Shut up hippie, it’s all a progressive hoax” are distracting us from the need to act like a single species that needs to share one planet. At least those of us who can’t follow Musk and Bezos into space and don’t look forward to a trans-human, or post-human future.
For Trump and his supporters
The most simple of equations
Drill.baby Drill ,= Burn baby Burn
Brian demonstrates just how little thinking actually takes place in woke communication. Anyone linking the climate change barrative to real world events is not thinking at all.
Go check how China responded to the recent earthquake in a very remote difficult to access area in Tibet
In less than 3 days following achieved
All homeless now in safe secure warm housing , no problems with food , clothes and water
All services reconnected
All damaged roads and bridges fully open
All injured receiving full modern hospital treatment
Temporary modern Porta cabins
With electric hot water and heating
Installed
Engineers now completed full survey of area
Whole construction infrastructure
Now fully ready to deploy in full as soon as green light given
To construct in Jiff time and for all
Affected , New housing way in excess of the standards of buildings damaged
New Schools , Medical facilities and other vital public service infrastructure
All should be completed within 4 to 6 months
Re arrangement of Economic infrastructures to guarantee a more viable resilient future
How
Simples
Good Governance
Proper contingency planning
Resources and capabilities already exist
Integrated joined up response teams
But here’s the big big reason
The PLA has enshrined in its constitution 2 solid duties that must be strictly adhered too
1. To defend the People
2 . In times of need to provide and assist the People
The PLA is fully manned , equipped and fully trained to deal with natural disasters expodistiously and endless funds in order to carry out it’s duties to the people who it serves. Anywhere Anytime No matter ethnic origins or wealth etc.
Why
Because Unity is of the Highest order to China and it’s people’s
All for one and One for All
Now as the Advert says
Go Compare
China is still operating large scale forced labour camps in Tibet, whose citizens are as badly abused as the Uighurs. Go away.
The Burden of Proof lies with the accuser
Therefore YOU GO AWAY
And do NOT return till you have conclusive proof
Note single statements from The BBC documentary in suffice
As the accusation made involve
Tens of Millions being affected
Therefore your evidence must be beyond all doubt
VW and other Large Multi Nationals inc. of the UN have conducted their own investigations all concluding
Nothing to see Here
And if you care to look in the right place you will soon find that the origin of these accusations lay firmly at the Door of a Secretive department of the CIA funded annually with
$ 125 billion to destabilise those who America can’t get to toe their line
You are perhaps aware that China is spending heavily to influence others as well.
Reading and believing CCP controlled news is even worse than taking the BBC at face value.
The California Democrats have certainly made mistakes and deserve the opprobrium for prioritizing social justice over technocratic competence. That said, nobody has addressed why California remains a one party state. Put simply: there is no alternative. As the Republicans have radicalized under MAGA’s influence they have become too crazy to trust with government. Ironically, being an individually competent Republican candidate counts for little when your party is unwavering in opposing issues like abortion rights – something a majority of voters support.
Christopher asserts utter nonsense. It is not Trump policies that led California to decide being prepated for known seasonal disasters is uncool. It is not Trump that landers billions in funds for the homeless. It is not Trump who opens the borders to inlawful, undocumented massive immigration. It is not Trump supporting child butchery in the bame of gender. Stop gaslighting.
“Gaslighting”? I think, gentle anonymous reader, that you are probably a MAGA bot rather than a human. Did I blame Trump for California’s mismanagement? No. Reread my words carefully. I blame the radicalism of the MAGA movement for why Republicans cannot make inroads against a one party state that is clearly mismanaged. I grew up in California during the 1980s. I saw how the Republicans committed slow motion political suicide under Governor Pete Wilson and never recovered. You cannot run as a Christian Nationalist and win in California. I’m sorry it hurts your feelings, but you just can’t. Show me a Republican who – at a bare minimum – supports a woman’s right to abortion and makes a respectful appearance at a Cinco de Mayo celebration, and I’ll show you somebody who can handily win against any social justice warrior Democrat in California. But the national party is a cult and will not allow such heterodoxy. Thus: California remains Blue no matter how ridiculous the Democrat.
Please provide examples of how Maga is radical. I provided examples of radical idiocratic policies that are opposed by Maga. Please show what is radical about Maga.
Again: give me an answer on my questions above without using “straw man”
As a California resident since 1978 I agree with much of what you say. Yet it took the recall of a pretty ridiculous Democrat in Gray Davis and a rather centrist Republican in Schwarzenegger to elect the last governor with an R here. It does seem that there would be a window for Republican resurgence in CA given all our hardships and follies, except for the party-swallowing extremism of the MAGA movement, and its divisive, cult-of-personality leader. Unchecked one-party rule in places like Texas, Florida, California, and New York heightens mismanagement and ominous regional divisions. I know many here only want to acknowledge extremism and mismanagement on the left, but I’m still allowed to post from somewhere in the center for the time being.
Who deprived California women of the Right to Abortion?
Give me his name!