Long and detailed story in the New York Times Magazine, today, about “the Blade,” the long stretch of a South Los Angeles boulevard that serves as the site of a shocking amount of child prostitution.
To repeat the Jim Treacher evergreen: "Modern journalism is all about deciding which facts the public shouldn't know because they might reflect badly on Democrats."
I trust you and believe this story, but there are so many elements of the story are unbelievable - they just don’t make sense: prosecutors who can arbitrarily enforce laws, a sexually deviant legislator pushing laws that make it easier to commit sex crimes, police unable to prevent or take action when they see crimes being committed. If you wrote this screen play 10 years ago, everyone would say it’s too unrealistic. Can’t imagine why anyone would want to live in California, not even in a gated community.
They live there because of “Blue Sky” Blue Sky is the the memory of how good Cali used to be with the weather and the jobs and the scenery and the nice neighborhoods and the functioning government and the flowers and did I mention the culture? Yes they had culture out the ying yang. That’s what they still think they have but they don’t. They only have the memory of all that great stuff that makes life good. All that good stuff is fragile and it takes adults making careful decisions and acting like actual adults.
Once you get into a death spiral (Scott Weiner is a sign you’re there) then you got to just ride that fiery beast right into the dirt.
Unfortunately, leaving California is not easy for people of modest means. Spouse and I have been talking about how to depart and where to go for a long time. With scarce resources it’s a real challenge.
We also happen to live in an area where food can be grown year ‘round and ugly insects are rare. Where else in the United States can that be said?
Probably just Hawaii but it’s expensive. Arizona from Phoenix south is in the maritime zone so it has a very long growing season but probably has other issues. Maybe Brownsville Tx. It’s pretty far south.
I'm going to make a confession here, since Chris hosts such a charming "safe space".
When I moved to LA in 2013 I was a pretty typical Bernie bro who had voted straight Dem since I was old enough to vote for Bubba in 1992 (this was in NYC).
And then, upon living in Venice, CA, I started to notice how politics are done around here and how policies are implemented almost entirely with punitive moralistic platitudes designed to make you either agree or reveal yourself as a hateful bigot (a pattern of thought that seemed familiar from my college Lit Dept), but most importantly—how these policies somehow remained sacrosanct even though they were obvious destructive failures and money pits.
I was reminded of all this when I read:
—The repeal, known as SB 357, was intended to prevent profiling of Black, brown and trans women based on how they dressed. And "reprogramming of the LAPD funds part of a 'continuing down payment in our quest for equity and reimagining public safety.' "
California is kind of run like a dictatorship with the dictator being the Platonic Victim who is the most important factor in every govt policy and who must always be centered, protected, adored. Everything for the Platonic Victim, nothing outside the Platonic Victim, nothing against the Platonic Victim: this is the heart of the Social Justice faith that runs this state. (Maybe it's less of a dictatorship and more like Therapeutic Communism?)
I remember going to neighborhood meetings and any issue that even only vaguely involved a sacred victim class—bums, migrants, black and brown people, sexual minorites—would be defended with life-and-death urgency and if you suggested something as radical as moving bum camps away from schools, you were denounced by a gaggle of screechers who looked ready to drag you to an auto-de-fe.
That was back in 2013 and there has been zero change, except for the fact that what was once confined to a weird little coastal outpost known for its freaks (Venice) has now conquered the whole country, and there is almost no emotional or political difference bw a nose-ringed zealot screaming for the death of everyone not on her team (Fascists!) and your average Dem politico, MSM journalist or liberal academic.
It's an oversimplification on purpose. We are a one-party, Democrat-run state. Nothing has improved, so which party should be blamed for the failures?
Newsom, himself, said in 2018 that if a Governor didn't fix homelessness, he would be a failure. Now, he seems to have all but forgotten that, while screaming it's always Trump's fault. Don't vote D. Definitely NO on 50, as we need that bipartisan independent redistricting commission to work.
Do these people hear themselves? I stopped being able to get away with that excuse by age 12.
We're basically spending hundreds of millions of state dollars to help Gavin's Presidential campaign. But, as our one-party state includes the media and academia, all of whom think of nothing but Trump, no one will mention this.
California is like a Titanic aimed directly full speed at the nearest iceberg.
Crises are the Democrats M.O. Create a shitstorm, then whine for more taxes to fix it...but never fix it. Because it's "them" meaning Republicans. They never admit their own failures. Ever. It's also the Soros model. Also HRC who is linked at the hip with Soros. Read The Shadow Party by David Horowitz (an ex-Marxist) to realize how deep this goes - Planned Parenthood is "deep state."
We're more red than people realize. If you look at the '24 election results, massive amounts of red showed, well over those in the '20 election.
Shiloh Marx (X) has done a lot of hard work and suing (he's just some guy, not a lawyer) to get jurisdictions to clean their voter rolls. Judicial Watch sued L.A. County 2X, with the first "settlement" removing 1M names after a recall election. The second loss by LAC to remove 1.4M hasn't been enacted yet.
One of the reasons my support of Trump has grown into allegiance is that people whose political choices I truly detest beyond words are fanatically opposed to every single thing he says or does.
Notice how the Gaza peace deal was signed only 2 weeks ago after 2 years of carnage, and was swept out of the news by a ballroom.
I jokingly say that the Civil War settled for all time the inability of a State to leave the Union, but it didn’t say anything about the other 49 “voting it off the island.”
2 yrs ago when there was a vote to recall Newscum, he lost by 93% of voters, who wanted him OUT of office. He ignored that and stayed in office. This was told to me by 2 different people who worked at the election, counting ballots. btw, I grew up in L.A. in 50s/60s/70s and haven't been back for almost 50 yrs. So VERY glad I left California.
I believe you. I "get it" that you left, but it made it much harder for the rest of us who couldn't leave. I'm fighting for my grandparents who left Mob Chicago 1940. brought their girls to live in the SFV. I am now in the house my mom and stepdad fought to save, working hard for the passage of Prop 13. My family has always given back. I wish more realized the dire situation we're in, and would fight like hell.
I remember Prop13 very well - my parents, devout Republicans, were so glad to see it passed. My dad worked hard to get it passed, too. My family has always given back, too. Both were in WW2, mom was one of the first WACs. Very sad to see what's happened to California. When I first left home and struck out on my own, I moved to San Francisco. That was in 1978 and it was a wonderful city then and so beautiful. Also affordable. Husband and I had to leave, we are retired and couldn't afford to live there any more. Also, we saw what was happening and it was scary. I hope Trump is able to clean out all the cities and arrest Gruesome and his (Scott) Weiner.
Oh, I'd get roped into helping and back in 1978, no stamps were Avery labels - you had to lick each and every one (eww). No Internet, so trips to the library to photocopy professional association lists, hand typing on a typewriter - stuffing, mailing - a lot of work. Everyone needs to appreciate how HARD people fought back!
I got invited to dinner, but the "dessert" was stuffing envelopes, licking stamps, typing letters. LOL
My mom taught (LAUSD) and saw the beginnings of communism with the Stull Act. Stepdad was an engineer who had his own business with a partner. Partner had 51%, so they sold the business in Altadena. Probably a good thing in the very long run, since it would have burned to a crisp in January. But he was LIVID over the property tax increases. Both belonged to professional associations, and it was teachers, engineers, pilots, everyone affiliated with the protection of the US that worked very hard to get that passed.
Stepdad had a heck of a time getting a job in aerospace/aircraft/engineering - anything...because by that point DiFi had decided the US was the enemy and China needed a-kissing. She even took Newsom to the CCP/China to introduce him all around. He's been groomed to take California down.
Californians have very GOOD friends in the DOJ, I am convinced. They'll do their best to make this right.
The Democrats who run the West Coast seem to be intent on changing into a place more fitting for CCP control. After the collapse, the West Coast will be full of people with low skills and little attachment to America who would be perfect citizens in a new Communist state. All those ports, too!
I agree with you in spirit, but the recall turned out differently than you remember: the turnout was 58%, and the vote against the recall was 62%. Yes, that means that 36% of California voters chose to keep Newscum, but no one knows how the other 42% of Calif voters would have voted.
The info I gave comes from TWO DIFFERENT SOURCES WHO COUNTED THE VOTES. I think they are a better source than media. I lived in CA most of my 70 yrs, voting there has been rigged for quite some time and the majority of voters there are conservative, only along the coast are there many libs. Newsom has also said that there are 11 million illegals in CA - and many if not most or all of them voted which is illegal. At this point, very few if any Californians like Newsom, they are very angry with him. IMO you are believing lies.
I don't know for sure but I think they probably were given results from all precincts in California. If not, they would have known who to contact to find out the truth. Californians have been fed up with Newsom for quite a long time.
I don’t believe that for a minute but my belief is not informed by facts so I will set that aside to make another point:
I recall the reported results showed over 60% voting to retain, touted by media. But consider this, at least 1 of three whose ballots got counted wanted him out. That’s not a great result for any politician, and I don’t see why that drum isn’t beat louder.
Up until about 1986, the usual balance between the rule of law and an iconoclastic plurality obtained. Conservatives looked after public order and monetary velocity, Liberals agitated to prevent utilitarianism from subsuming individuals into rigid hierarchies of indenture. Both agreed that Liberty for individuals was paramount, quibbling only about means and parameters.
Massive migration of capital and persons began anew with the tech boom, the choice architecture for obtaining prosperity was transformed, and so did the praxeology of regulatory capture. Means changed as the formerly placid bureaucrats were replace by apparatchiki, prosperity returned to the "gold rush" praxis and we are now living with the result.
To some degree it's a function of the increased automation that afflicts the rest of the developed world, but California's function as gateway to the Pacific Rim has incentivised a rather unique type of imbalance that engenders the "soft" totalitarianism you describe.
It isn't really soft; the rise of kleptocratic oligarchy has concentrated business interests into a very small cohort of negotiators facing self-serving regulators. The virtue-signalling is window-dressing. When we follow the money, the trail leads to the usual suspects.
This isn't meant to discount the moral hazards involved with the social aspects; some of it is quid pro quo, but none of it takes place without the accrual of funding.
There hasn't been an honest election in many decades. My Grandma volunteered for a lot of things, but one was for working the polls during election time. 1950s, 1960s, 4-5 booths for Democrats, 1-2 booths for Republicans. Equipment malfunctions, and back in the day, stamp pads ran dry, so using the X stamp would leave a faint mark.
"Platonic victim". Precisely. They go by many nebulous monikers. "Persons at risk". "People of color". "The [name protected victim group here] community". This is the weaponization of guilt and empathy. Completely disingenuous. Exhausted to the point of satire. All in the service of unspeakable evil.
Yet here we are somehow goaded into talking about the prostitution/rape of children like it's a some grey area for political debate, because "love is love" after all and children have sexual feelings and some even know they are the wrong gender and can consent to some "adult medical provider" mutilating their genitals in the name of "gender affirming care".
It's not that they have moved the Overton window. They have utterly blown it to pieces so that in our moral panic we are willing to bargain with these demons: "Um, I guess the mutilation is okay if they only start with puberty blockers/chemical castration, and with parental consent." And "Well, if the police are racist/sexist against sex workers- who are making a valid career choice in the war against male bigotry (their bodies, their choice)- then they shouldn't question their age either, right?" And finally, "Why shouldn't a 5 year old have the right to choose their gender and sexual relationships with adults? It's discriminatory and fascist to decide otherwise...I think, probably."
They are all political operatives for Satan. Scott Weiner is one of the most openly evil and his political career needs to be destroyed down to the subatomic level. But underneath it all Newsome is the same, just with more hair gel and less BDSM gear.
How to fight this evil is the question. We will not vote, legislate, or sue our way out of this. And for many should-be warriors, it seems that as long as they don't take away our Netflix and TicTok they will consent to just about any debauchery. We are at a serious crossroads for humanity.
"So there’s the answer to the question the New York Times asks: “Can Anyone Rescue the Trafficked Girls of L.A.’s Figueroa Street?” You can rescue those girls if you can shove California Democrats out of the way. They are the cause."
Can you comment this to NYT magazine? Because I won't give them the buck I'd need to be able to do it.
No, but it also archives it. You'd have to go to a newspaper's or online site's own page to register, then comment. With so much being deleted off the Internet, it's a good way to try and save the truth.
AI is being run by people who are well under 40 years old. Note the responses...no one is thinking or knowing any history at all.
you are seeing what I see. The Internet, which I used to view as the greatest library resource in history, enclosed and dismantled by ignorant children. And so are the libraries themselves, increasingly. No telling where it will end.
When you see some especially important information or history that seems to be unique or rare, save it as a hard copy. Buy books. And magazines.
Children is correct. See answers for AI, especially Grok on X? It's infantile.
I don't think anyone over 35 writes those lame answers. When you correct Grok, you don't get an apology either, just a comment about it being "a different viewpoint" - yes, called FACTS. LOL
In many ways, in a world of inestimably bad politicians, Wiener may be the worst in my lifetime. Which is why the D's will elevate him to national office, of course. Who are these unthinking people?
You ever notice how dog owners end up looking like their dogs? Like how bulldog owners are barrell-shaped and have big jowels on their faces?
Same thing happens with names. Like, Wieners. Anthony, Scott, being a Wiener makes people pedophiles. Or maybe it's self-selecting, in the genes of a Wiener?
DOJ will be monitoring this election, and over 3M obsolete voter records have been removed. We have a good chance of flipping red, if more than 40% turnout happens.
IF you know anyone who lives in California, we must do better than a 40% turnout for this proposition. NO on 50. It's racist, it's illegal, it's against both the California and US constitutions. It's lies against Texas (Biden admin. ordered them to gerrymander, eventually overturned), and it has nothing to do with Trump.
But Dems blame any Republican, especially when one is President.
Go on the LA hood life tour and report back in your signature style. Mind blowing how much depravity goes on in plain sight. We drove by streetwalkers before 2020, probably way worse now: https://www.lahoodlifetours.com/
That's when I left, too. It was such a a fun place to live! Beautiful, but I'll never go back. New Mexico was always bad but now it's a lot worse. NM is also a sanctuary city in a sanctuary state. There are large areas in Albuquerque that I'll never go again either. Downtown has become a literal toilet (why do they defecate on the sidewalks and streets anyway?).
I can believe it. 40 years ago, I was in one of my early office jobs. First day in a new one, they were explaining in intricate detail about the complex to me recycling rules they had in place. I made a rather unenthusiastic comment, to say the least. Nothing was said but an hour later they suggested training was done for the day and I could come back tomorrow.
Early next morning, got a phone call that said don’t bother coming back. Upon reflection, I am glad I found out earlier than later about their complex policies.
So, yes, things have been brewing a long time there.
I'm a carpenter in Sacramento and our union supports "democrats" here. I'm opposed to it supporting any one party- they should poll each party yearly to see who they'll support that year. But our union is 100% pro democrat- at least the LEADERSHIP is. All the rank and file, I bet at least 75%, is for Pres. Trump, because he has aligned with the WORKING PEOPLE.
We have seen Scott Weiner slithering around on location here. We elbow each other, "There is that creep again". We know who he is. We don't approve of his sort.
I know exactly what you’re talking about! The union (uh, “professional association”) I belonged to likewise unfailingly supported the Dems while the rank and file were overwhelmingly conservative. In a private (and weak) moment, one of the top tier leadership guys admitted to me that despite what the membership thought, and wanted, the Association had always, and would always support Dems because we were labor and the Dems “always took care of labor.”
Don't you vote for union officers? Can't the 75% that support Trump vote out the idiots who are ultraprogressive? Don't know much about unions but that seems the place to start.
Union members have to get the majority of the membership to push against this. It needs to be a unified voice. The management has to be pushed to not go along with the AFL/CIO democratic candidates that are dues are funding. Unfortunately in my local the membership is just greedy and only wants higher wages where my local's members are overpaid already. I question if our dues are any match for the money that is donated on behalf of alphabet mafia that is pushing this type of legislation. My witnessing of legislators in Sacramento makes me think the union money dwarfs Alphabet mafia money.
There is a running joke in the circles I run in online that Figueroa has a river of pink slime underneath it that causes the majority of the crimes that come in over the scanner. I didn't know the river ran straight into City Hall.....and of course Weiner's fingerprints are all over it. (Did I really just type that? Disgusting.) I'd say thank you for digging into this, but man, just thinking about that guy grosses me out. The word Vileness doesn't do him justice.
Trump is proving that it is possible for the government to enforce law and maintain order if that is its goal. The border is secure and Washington D.C. and Memphis, TN are exponentially more livable than they were prior to the political decision to enforce the law. Giuliani did the same thing in NY in the 1990s.
The crime and chaos in LA is not inevitable. It can be controlled. CAs so-called leaders and, apparently, a majority of its citizens choose not to control it
“California Democrats are the cause.” So true. Scott-Pedo-Weiner is horrific, and he’s leading the charge to make it legal to have sex with minors in California, incrementally. It appears that he will replace Nancy Pelosi. So, his agenda will eventually be brought to a national level. If you can’t be disgusted by Democrats enough, wait until Weiner is in the US Congress.
Whoever the republicans run against the dem ("too early to choose" say the news reports), support him/her. ! If you live in California, do everything you can. If you don't, send all you can. This is a critical race for the nation.
Wouldn’t it be great to witness Scott and Gavin left alone without money or security in this stretch of real estate. Then have one of the pre-teens begin screaming that both of them ‘dined and dashed’, let the pimps dish out a little street justice.
The NYT will attempt to fix the problem just as soon as they figure out how to lay blame at the feet of Trump, Republicans, MAGA and conservatives in general. Until then, they’ll have to be satisfied with patting themselves on the back for noticing the problem.
Sick at heart over this. I lived in Orange county 25 years ago and prostitutes were a rare sight then. There were always a few of them near Disneyland. Not surprised. That whole area was run down. At least those ladies were obviously adults.
This is horrible! Why are there so many pedos in this country running around loose? Democrats. Probably because a lot of them are are in state legislatures and Congress. How did Weiner get to be in that position? Democrats.
The ultra-wealthy chase ever more excessive stimulation as their unfettered tastes inevitably become jaded. Just look at the Pritzkers and transgenderism, which stems from sado-masochism. Paedophilia is an inevitable destination on that road to hell, though not even the most extreme. The Democrats are the party of extreme wealth and extreme poverty. Wiener is one of the former. A cabal of perverts is trying to normalise their spiritual corruption to avoid facing the disgust and condemnation of normal folk.
Little children are the wrong sort of victim. As Thomas Sowell noted, the sort of victims celebrated by the elitist connoisseurs of morality, like a fine delicacy in food, must necessarily be repulsive or onerous from the viewpoint of the deplorable underclasses. How otherwise could the elites signal their refined, educated, tastes to each other?
This also overlaps with what I note to Robert--and the role of child/teen grooming and exploitation in the entire "gay" culture (I can't say subculture, because it rules irrevocably now, with no possibility of pushback).
"It can't be Elite Good Taste if it doesn't disgust those who have any remaining sense of repugnance." It's like psychopaths, who can never again get the electric jolt of that first ugly Thrill Kill...so resort to more and more extreme efforts to try to recreate it...and cannot.
Same with causing disgust in the moral. There is a sort of loosh-harvesting "pleasure" in causing hurt and offense, for a certain type of /Homo/. But neurons being what they are, the extinction function (neurological) guarantees that the same stimulus will not continue to generate the same response.
Robert, you've honed right in on the most toxic depth of the entire miasm: the idea that OH WELL PEOPLE JUST WILL BE PEOPLE YA KNOW AND IF YOU TRY TO REIN THAT IN YOU'LL JUST DO WORSE!!! MUH PROHIBITION!!!!!
A completely isomeric mindset took over with All Things "Gay" in California (and NY and elsewhere, but especially CA). I'm trying to put together some thoughts on this...against my own sense of nausea and fury. I just wanted to say, THIS GUY GETS IT.
To repeat the Jim Treacher evergreen: "Modern journalism is all about deciding which facts the public shouldn't know because they might reflect badly on Democrats."
Related:
https://x.com/iowahawkblog/status/332494589934047234?lang=en
I trust you and believe this story, but there are so many elements of the story are unbelievable - they just don’t make sense: prosecutors who can arbitrarily enforce laws, a sexually deviant legislator pushing laws that make it easier to commit sex crimes, police unable to prevent or take action when they see crimes being committed. If you wrote this screen play 10 years ago, everyone would say it’s too unrealistic. Can’t imagine why anyone would want to live in California, not even in a gated community.
As a Californian who has been following this insanity for decades, I can attest that it is all true. We have some pretty disgusting leaders.
We need to stop calling them leaders. Leaders don’t do crap like this.
The thing is, they aren't supposed to be "leaders." They are supposed to be public servants.
Fair point.
They live there because of “Blue Sky” Blue Sky is the the memory of how good Cali used to be with the weather and the jobs and the scenery and the nice neighborhoods and the functioning government and the flowers and did I mention the culture? Yes they had culture out the ying yang. That’s what they still think they have but they don’t. They only have the memory of all that great stuff that makes life good. All that good stuff is fragile and it takes adults making careful decisions and acting like actual adults.
Once you get into a death spiral (Scott Weiner is a sign you’re there) then you got to just ride that fiery beast right into the dirt.
Unfortunately, leaving California is not easy for people of modest means. Spouse and I have been talking about how to depart and where to go for a long time. With scarce resources it’s a real challenge.
We also happen to live in an area where food can be grown year ‘round and ugly insects are rare. Where else in the United States can that be said?
Probably just Hawaii but it’s expensive. Arizona from Phoenix south is in the maritime zone so it has a very long growing season but probably has other issues. Maybe Brownsville Tx. It’s pretty far south.
💯
I lived there during “blue sky” and loved it, no more. Left in 2018 for greener pasturs in NC.
I'm going to make a confession here, since Chris hosts such a charming "safe space".
When I moved to LA in 2013 I was a pretty typical Bernie bro who had voted straight Dem since I was old enough to vote for Bubba in 1992 (this was in NYC).
And then, upon living in Venice, CA, I started to notice how politics are done around here and how policies are implemented almost entirely with punitive moralistic platitudes designed to make you either agree or reveal yourself as a hateful bigot (a pattern of thought that seemed familiar from my college Lit Dept), but most importantly—how these policies somehow remained sacrosanct even though they were obvious destructive failures and money pits.
I was reminded of all this when I read:
—The repeal, known as SB 357, was intended to prevent profiling of Black, brown and trans women based on how they dressed. And "reprogramming of the LAPD funds part of a 'continuing down payment in our quest for equity and reimagining public safety.' "
California is kind of run like a dictatorship with the dictator being the Platonic Victim who is the most important factor in every govt policy and who must always be centered, protected, adored. Everything for the Platonic Victim, nothing outside the Platonic Victim, nothing against the Platonic Victim: this is the heart of the Social Justice faith that runs this state. (Maybe it's less of a dictatorship and more like Therapeutic Communism?)
I remember going to neighborhood meetings and any issue that even only vaguely involved a sacred victim class—bums, migrants, black and brown people, sexual minorites—would be defended with life-and-death urgency and if you suggested something as radical as moving bum camps away from schools, you were denounced by a gaggle of screechers who looked ready to drag you to an auto-de-fe.
That was back in 2013 and there has been zero change, except for the fact that what was once confined to a weird little coastal outpost known for its freaks (Venice) has now conquered the whole country, and there is almost no emotional or political difference bw a nose-ringed zealot screaming for the death of everyone not on her team (Fascists!) and your average Dem politico, MSM journalist or liberal academic.
Please, someone, tell me how this ends!!
It's an oversimplification on purpose. We are a one-party, Democrat-run state. Nothing has improved, so which party should be blamed for the failures?
Newsom, himself, said in 2018 that if a Governor didn't fix homelessness, he would be a failure. Now, he seems to have all but forgotten that, while screaming it's always Trump's fault. Don't vote D. Definitely NO on 50, as we need that bipartisan independent redistricting commission to work.
NO on 50!
We have to do X because Texas did it first!
Do these people hear themselves? I stopped being able to get away with that excuse by age 12.
We're basically spending hundreds of millions of state dollars to help Gavin's Presidential campaign. But, as our one-party state includes the media and academia, all of whom think of nothing but Trump, no one will mention this.
California is like a Titanic aimed directly full speed at the nearest iceberg.
Crises are the Democrats M.O. Create a shitstorm, then whine for more taxes to fix it...but never fix it. Because it's "them" meaning Republicans. They never admit their own failures. Ever. It's also the Soros model. Also HRC who is linked at the hip with Soros. Read The Shadow Party by David Horowitz (an ex-Marxist) to realize how deep this goes - Planned Parenthood is "deep state."
I was just in Sonoma and was shocked to see No on 50 lawn signs. That gives me hope.
We're more red than people realize. If you look at the '24 election results, massive amounts of red showed, well over those in the '20 election.
Shiloh Marx (X) has done a lot of hard work and suing (he's just some guy, not a lawyer) to get jurisdictions to clean their voter rolls. Judicial Watch sued L.A. County 2X, with the first "settlement" removing 1M names after a recall election. The second loss by LAC to remove 1.4M hasn't been enacted yet.
Corrupt...you better believe it.
Good news! We can't be so stupid as to make our politics even more corrupt just so Gavin can play mighty Trump killer...hopefully sanity wins.
Californians can't be stupid? Since when? They've been pretty stupid since I've been alive. >65 years.
One of the reasons my support of Trump has grown into allegiance is that people whose political choices I truly detest beyond words are fanatically opposed to every single thing he says or does.
Notice how the Gaza peace deal was signed only 2 weeks ago after 2 years of carnage, and was swept out of the news by a ballroom.
I jokingly say that the Civil War settled for all time the inability of a State to leave the Union, but it didn’t say anything about the other 49 “voting it off the island.”
2 yrs ago when there was a vote to recall Newscum, he lost by 93% of voters, who wanted him OUT of office. He ignored that and stayed in office. This was told to me by 2 different people who worked at the election, counting ballots. btw, I grew up in L.A. in 50s/60s/70s and haven't been back for almost 50 yrs. So VERY glad I left California.
I believe you. I "get it" that you left, but it made it much harder for the rest of us who couldn't leave. I'm fighting for my grandparents who left Mob Chicago 1940. brought their girls to live in the SFV. I am now in the house my mom and stepdad fought to save, working hard for the passage of Prop 13. My family has always given back. I wish more realized the dire situation we're in, and would fight like hell.
I remember Prop13 very well - my parents, devout Republicans, were so glad to see it passed. My dad worked hard to get it passed, too. My family has always given back, too. Both were in WW2, mom was one of the first WACs. Very sad to see what's happened to California. When I first left home and struck out on my own, I moved to San Francisco. That was in 1978 and it was a wonderful city then and so beautiful. Also affordable. Husband and I had to leave, we are retired and couldn't afford to live there any more. Also, we saw what was happening and it was scary. I hope Trump is able to clean out all the cities and arrest Gruesome and his (Scott) Weiner.
Oh, I'd get roped into helping and back in 1978, no stamps were Avery labels - you had to lick each and every one (eww). No Internet, so trips to the library to photocopy professional association lists, hand typing on a typewriter - stuffing, mailing - a lot of work. Everyone needs to appreciate how HARD people fought back!
I got invited to dinner, but the "dessert" was stuffing envelopes, licking stamps, typing letters. LOL
My mom taught (LAUSD) and saw the beginnings of communism with the Stull Act. Stepdad was an engineer who had his own business with a partner. Partner had 51%, so they sold the business in Altadena. Probably a good thing in the very long run, since it would have burned to a crisp in January. But he was LIVID over the property tax increases. Both belonged to professional associations, and it was teachers, engineers, pilots, everyone affiliated with the protection of the US that worked very hard to get that passed.
Stepdad had a heck of a time getting a job in aerospace/aircraft/engineering - anything...because by that point DiFi had decided the US was the enemy and China needed a-kissing. She even took Newsom to the CCP/China to introduce him all around. He's been groomed to take California down.
Californians have very GOOD friends in the DOJ, I am convinced. They'll do their best to make this right.
The Democrats who run the West Coast seem to be intent on changing into a place more fitting for CCP control. After the collapse, the West Coast will be full of people with low skills and little attachment to America who would be perfect citizens in a new Communist state. All those ports, too!
I agree with you in spirit, but the recall turned out differently than you remember: the turnout was 58%, and the vote against the recall was 62%. Yes, that means that 36% of California voters chose to keep Newscum, but no one knows how the other 42% of Calif voters would have voted.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_California_gubernatorial_recall_election
The Future belongs to those who show up.
The info I gave comes from TWO DIFFERENT SOURCES WHO COUNTED THE VOTES. I think they are a better source than media. I lived in CA most of my 70 yrs, voting there has been rigged for quite some time and the majority of voters there are conservative, only along the coast are there many libs. Newsom has also said that there are 11 million illegals in CA - and many if not most or all of them voted which is illegal. At this point, very few if any Californians like Newsom, they are very angry with him. IMO you are believing lies.
“Two sources”
I’m curious: Were these 2 individual election workers? If so, wouldn’t their observations be limited to the precinct or county where they worked?
I don't know for sure but I think they probably were given results from all precincts in California. If not, they would have known who to contact to find out the truth. Californians have been fed up with Newsom for quite a long time.
I dislike Newsom, but your '93%' loss number is pure fantasy. We didn't have the numbers.
The ones who counted the votes had the numbers and my sources were 2 of those who counted.
I don’t believe that for a minute but my belief is not informed by facts so I will set that aside to make another point:
I recall the reported results showed over 60% voting to retain, touted by media. But consider this, at least 1 of three whose ballots got counted wanted him out. That’s not a great result for any politician, and I don’t see why that drum isn’t beat louder.
Therapeutic Communism - that’s brilliant.
Thanks!
Great phrase coining, yes. Kudos.
"Please, someone, tell me how this ends!!"
Badly, dear fellow, very badly indeed.
Up until about 1986, the usual balance between the rule of law and an iconoclastic plurality obtained. Conservatives looked after public order and monetary velocity, Liberals agitated to prevent utilitarianism from subsuming individuals into rigid hierarchies of indenture. Both agreed that Liberty for individuals was paramount, quibbling only about means and parameters.
Massive migration of capital and persons began anew with the tech boom, the choice architecture for obtaining prosperity was transformed, and so did the praxeology of regulatory capture. Means changed as the formerly placid bureaucrats were replace by apparatchiki, prosperity returned to the "gold rush" praxis and we are now living with the result.
To some degree it's a function of the increased automation that afflicts the rest of the developed world, but California's function as gateway to the Pacific Rim has incentivised a rather unique type of imbalance that engenders the "soft" totalitarianism you describe.
It isn't really soft; the rise of kleptocratic oligarchy has concentrated business interests into a very small cohort of negotiators facing self-serving regulators. The virtue-signalling is window-dressing. When we follow the money, the trail leads to the usual suspects.
This isn't meant to discount the moral hazards involved with the social aspects; some of it is quid pro quo, but none of it takes place without the accrual of funding.
The Market God rules the world and capital flows are his blood. We on the same page!
Badly my friend, badly.
oh, they're "reimagining public safety", all right.
Does this correlate to the last time California ran an honest election?
There hasn't been an honest election in many decades. My Grandma volunteered for a lot of things, but one was for working the polls during election time. 1950s, 1960s, 4-5 booths for Democrats, 1-2 booths for Republicans. Equipment malfunctions, and back in the day, stamp pads ran dry, so using the X stamp would leave a faint mark.
"Platonic victim". Precisely. They go by many nebulous monikers. "Persons at risk". "People of color". "The [name protected victim group here] community". This is the weaponization of guilt and empathy. Completely disingenuous. Exhausted to the point of satire. All in the service of unspeakable evil.
Yet here we are somehow goaded into talking about the prostitution/rape of children like it's a some grey area for political debate, because "love is love" after all and children have sexual feelings and some even know they are the wrong gender and can consent to some "adult medical provider" mutilating their genitals in the name of "gender affirming care".
It's not that they have moved the Overton window. They have utterly blown it to pieces so that in our moral panic we are willing to bargain with these demons: "Um, I guess the mutilation is okay if they only start with puberty blockers/chemical castration, and with parental consent." And "Well, if the police are racist/sexist against sex workers- who are making a valid career choice in the war against male bigotry (their bodies, their choice)- then they shouldn't question their age either, right?" And finally, "Why shouldn't a 5 year old have the right to choose their gender and sexual relationships with adults? It's discriminatory and fascist to decide otherwise...I think, probably."
They are all political operatives for Satan. Scott Weiner is one of the most openly evil and his political career needs to be destroyed down to the subatomic level. But underneath it all Newsome is the same, just with more hair gel and less BDSM gear.
How to fight this evil is the question. We will not vote, legislate, or sue our way out of this. And for many should-be warriors, it seems that as long as they don't take away our Netflix and TicTok they will consent to just about any debauchery. We are at a serious crossroads for humanity.
"our quest for equity and reimagining public safety”
🤪
"Platonic Victim"....perfect! Of course, I'll have to steal this and use it......
feel free! Thanks
Editor: Your comment has been flagged for deletion. You neglected to capitalize "Black" in graf 6.
It ends when your children can achieve Victimhood by cutting off their genitals.
No wonder Gavin Newsom doesn’t want the feds in California. Illegal aliens are just the tip of the iceberg.
The Democrat Party is demonic.
"So there’s the answer to the question the New York Times asks: “Can Anyone Rescue the Trafficked Girls of L.A.’s Figueroa Street?” You can rescue those girls if you can shove California Democrats out of the way. They are the cause."
Can you comment this to NYT magazine? Because I won't give them the buck I'd need to be able to do it.
Use archive.ph or archive.is (same company). Easy, fast, free, and almost always bypasses the paywall.
That lets you read the article, but you can’t comment that way.
No, but it also archives it. You'd have to go to a newspaper's or online site's own page to register, then comment. With so much being deleted off the Internet, it's a good way to try and save the truth.
AI is being run by people who are well under 40 years old. Note the responses...no one is thinking or knowing any history at all.
you are seeing what I see. The Internet, which I used to view as the greatest library resource in history, enclosed and dismantled by ignorant children. And so are the libraries themselves, increasingly. No telling where it will end.
When you see some especially important information or history that seems to be unique or rare, save it as a hard copy. Buy books. And magazines.
Children is correct. See answers for AI, especially Grok on X? It's infantile.
I don't think anyone over 35 writes those lame answers. When you correct Grok, you don't get an apology either, just a comment about it being "a different viewpoint" - yes, called FACTS. LOL
Pureed Midwittery. The special on the menu, forever.
I didn’t order that! But I’m paying for it nonetheless, in Metadata.
Scott Wiener is an evil degenerate. As are the Californians that provide oxygen to the likes of him.
In many ways, in a world of inestimably bad politicians, Wiener may be the worst in my lifetime. Which is why the D's will elevate him to national office, of course. Who are these unthinking people?
...they are evil incarnate (not a phrase I use but sadly seems appropriate).
You ever notice how dog owners end up looking like their dogs? Like how bulldog owners are barrell-shaped and have big jowels on their faces?
Same thing happens with names. Like, Wieners. Anthony, Scott, being a Wiener makes people pedophiles. Or maybe it's self-selecting, in the genes of a Wiener?
I don't think that Scott Wiener is an oxygen breather at all. He is an alien species. Breathes pure N2.
California is a One Party state.
Everything happening there flows from that reality.
DOJ will be monitoring this election, and over 3M obsolete voter records have been removed. We have a good chance of flipping red, if more than 40% turnout happens.
🙏Hope your right AngrySenior
Thanks, I hope so, too! A lot of people are feeling better about it, not just me.
I'll bet you are a Judicial Watch fan too.
Yes, long time supporter.
Me too, they're the best weapon I can think of to fight back.
Wow that would be amazing!
IF you know anyone who lives in California, we must do better than a 40% turnout for this proposition. NO on 50. It's racist, it's illegal, it's against both the California and US constitutions. It's lies against Texas (Biden admin. ordered them to gerrymander, eventually overturned), and it has nothing to do with Trump.
But Dems blame any Republican, especially when one is President.
Won't the state have the po po out keeping people from leaving their homes to vote?
No, that doesn't even make sense. The only thing keeping people home, would be a quake or a riot. Both are possible, but a remote possibility.
Exactly
Go on the LA hood life tour and report back in your signature style. Mind blowing how much depravity goes on in plain sight. We drove by streetwalkers before 2020, probably way worse now: https://www.lahoodlifetours.com/
Last time I was in LA, must have been about 1998..
Decided I would never come back.
Cannot imagine it now...
That's when I left, too. It was such a a fun place to live! Beautiful, but I'll never go back. New Mexico was always bad but now it's a lot worse. NM is also a sanctuary city in a sanctuary state. There are large areas in Albuquerque that I'll never go again either. Downtown has become a literal toilet (why do they defecate on the sidewalks and streets anyway?).
I have read that beautiful NM has gone blue.
Canadian, drove across Canada, with a buddy.
Western states on our way to Expo 86 in VCR, BC.
Couer D'Alene was nice, Portland not so nice, Seattle as it was then.
That was almost 40 yrs. ago...
I can believe it. 40 years ago, I was in one of my early office jobs. First day in a new one, they were explaining in intricate detail about the complex to me recycling rules they had in place. I made a rather unenthusiastic comment, to say the least. Nothing was said but an hour later they suggested training was done for the day and I could come back tomorrow.
Early next morning, got a phone call that said don’t bother coming back. Upon reflection, I am glad I found out earlier than later about their complex policies.
So, yes, things have been brewing a long time there.
Probably one of the bluest! Even if a Conservative was elected, it wouldn't matter. They cheat a LOT here. Soros and at least one cartel.
So very, very sad. I drove all through NM in 1989 and loved it, it was so beautiful and clean.
Not so clean anymore!
My now-husband and I used to call it "Whore-gazing." but that was directed to the men (not boys) who were strutting their wares on the boulevard.
I'm a carpenter in Sacramento and our union supports "democrats" here. I'm opposed to it supporting any one party- they should poll each party yearly to see who they'll support that year. But our union is 100% pro democrat- at least the LEADERSHIP is. All the rank and file, I bet at least 75%, is for Pres. Trump, because he has aligned with the WORKING PEOPLE.
We have seen Scott Weiner slithering around on location here. We elbow each other, "There is that creep again". We know who he is. We don't approve of his sort.
I know exactly what you’re talking about! The union (uh, “professional association”) I belonged to likewise unfailingly supported the Dems while the rank and file were overwhelmingly conservative. In a private (and weak) moment, one of the top tier leadership guys admitted to me that despite what the membership thought, and wanted, the Association had always, and would always support Dems because we were labor and the Dems “always took care of labor.”
And so it goes…
If one person gets brave and opposes the union, more and more will gather courage and do the same. Someone has to start or nothing will change. .
Except that they do not And never have supported labor.
They paid it lip service back in the day, when I listened.
i.e. kickbacks to the leadership.
Don't you vote for union officers? Can't the 75% that support Trump vote out the idiots who are ultraprogressive? Don't know much about unions but that seems the place to start.
Will take money, time, and expertise to mount an opposition plank/platform in any union election. Will need a lot of legal support.
Union members have to get the majority of the membership to push against this. It needs to be a unified voice. The management has to be pushed to not go along with the AFL/CIO democratic candidates that are dues are funding. Unfortunately in my local the membership is just greedy and only wants higher wages where my local's members are overpaid already. I question if our dues are any match for the money that is donated on behalf of alphabet mafia that is pushing this type of legislation. My witnessing of legislators in Sacramento makes me think the union money dwarfs Alphabet mafia money.
All unions, AFAIK, always want higher wages for less, and very shoddy, work.
If I were him i wouldn't hasn't out where people who didn't like me had access to power tools.
There is a running joke in the circles I run in online that Figueroa has a river of pink slime underneath it that causes the majority of the crimes that come in over the scanner. I didn't know the river ran straight into City Hall.....and of course Weiner's fingerprints are all over it. (Did I really just type that? Disgusting.) I'd say thank you for digging into this, but man, just thinking about that guy grosses me out. The word Vileness doesn't do him justice.
In Ghostbusters, the team fought the pink slime and won. They are all retired or woke now, except maybe Dan Akyroyd. 👻
Maybe Ghostbusters got too close to the truth, which was why they had to occlude it with a woke remake.
Omg that’s got to be it! There’s no other excuse for that crappy movie! At least I’m assuming it’s crappy, couldn’t bring myself to watch it 🤣
Trump is proving that it is possible for the government to enforce law and maintain order if that is its goal. The border is secure and Washington D.C. and Memphis, TN are exponentially more livable than they were prior to the political decision to enforce the law. Giuliani did the same thing in NY in the 1990s.
The crime and chaos in LA is not inevitable. It can be controlled. CAs so-called leaders and, apparently, a majority of its citizens choose not to control it
You beat me to it, I totally agree.
“California Democrats are the cause.” So true. Scott-Pedo-Weiner is horrific, and he’s leading the charge to make it legal to have sex with minors in California, incrementally. It appears that he will replace Nancy Pelosi. So, his agenda will eventually be brought to a national level. If you can’t be disgusted by Democrats enough, wait until Weiner is in the US Congress.
The only potential Republican with state-wide voter recognition is Steve Garvey. The R's have a very thin bench.
A baseball player from the era before color tv. Yup, “thin bench” fits.
Whoever the republicans run against the dem ("too early to choose" say the news reports), support him/her. ! If you live in California, do everything you can. If you don't, send all you can. This is a critical race for the nation.
Wouldn’t it be great to witness Scott and Gavin left alone without money or security in this stretch of real estate. Then have one of the pre-teens begin screaming that both of them ‘dined and dashed’, let the pimps dish out a little street justice.
bsn
Where's a meteorite when you need it?!
You have the San Andreas, no meteorite needed.
That's going to take too long.
3I/Atlas ???
😏
The NYT will attempt to fix the problem just as soon as they figure out how to lay blame at the feet of Trump, Republicans, MAGA and conservatives in general. Until then, they’ll have to be satisfied with patting themselves on the back for noticing the problem.
Fix , my ass. More scum of the earth .
the passive voice itself is to blame, obviously
The use of passive voice has occurred
Hahaha
Using passive voice is a tell for dismantling accountability
Sick at heart over this. I lived in Orange county 25 years ago and prostitutes were a rare sight then. There were always a few of them near Disneyland. Not surprised. That whole area was run down. At least those ladies were obviously adults.
This is horrible! Why are there so many pedos in this country running around loose? Democrats. Probably because a lot of them are are in state legislatures and Congress. How did Weiner get to be in that position? Democrats.
The ultra-wealthy chase ever more excessive stimulation as their unfettered tastes inevitably become jaded. Just look at the Pritzkers and transgenderism, which stems from sado-masochism. Paedophilia is an inevitable destination on that road to hell, though not even the most extreme. The Democrats are the party of extreme wealth and extreme poverty. Wiener is one of the former. A cabal of perverts is trying to normalise their spiritual corruption to avoid facing the disgust and condemnation of normal folk.
And this is what is labeled "victimless crime"? What am I missing here?
Little children are the wrong sort of victim. As Thomas Sowell noted, the sort of victims celebrated by the elitist connoisseurs of morality, like a fine delicacy in food, must necessarily be repulsive or onerous from the viewpoint of the deplorable underclasses. How otherwise could the elites signal their refined, educated, tastes to each other?
This also overlaps with what I note to Robert--and the role of child/teen grooming and exploitation in the entire "gay" culture (I can't say subculture, because it rules irrevocably now, with no possibility of pushback).
"It can't be Elite Good Taste if it doesn't disgust those who have any remaining sense of repugnance." It's like psychopaths, who can never again get the electric jolt of that first ugly Thrill Kill...so resort to more and more extreme efforts to try to recreate it...and cannot.
Same with causing disgust in the moral. There is a sort of loosh-harvesting "pleasure" in causing hurt and offense, for a certain type of /Homo/. But neurons being what they are, the extinction function (neurological) guarantees that the same stimulus will not continue to generate the same response.
Robert, you've honed right in on the most toxic depth of the entire miasm: the idea that OH WELL PEOPLE JUST WILL BE PEOPLE YA KNOW AND IF YOU TRY TO REIN THAT IN YOU'LL JUST DO WORSE!!! MUH PROHIBITION!!!!!
A completely isomeric mindset took over with All Things "Gay" in California (and NY and elsewhere, but especially CA). I'm trying to put together some thoughts on this...against my own sense of nausea and fury. I just wanted to say, THIS GUY GETS IT.