Helping California Help Itself

Helping California Help Itself

While the wild fires rage on in the canyons of Los Angeles, the world is witnessing the near total destruction of whole communities. What was once a high end enclave in Pacific Palisades looks like Dresden after the fire bombing of World War II. It appears that Hollywood – home of America’s most fatuous phonies – is next on the list. It is almost biblical as when storms and earthquakes devastated the ancient Holy Lands as
God meted out punishment to those who sinned brazenly – except in this instance there are literally tens of thousands of Angelinos who are suffering from a disaster that was not theirs in the making.

This was by and large a natural disaster made worse by a long list of failures by local and state governments in California. You can wring your hands forever as to whether “global warming” was the cause, a contributing factor or even exists at all. What there is no argument about is that if there is global warning, the efforts and costs of mitigation pursued by the United States in general and California in particular have virtually no impact given the lack of concurrent efforts by China, India, and much of South America. While America has demonstrated a sustained effort to drive down the release of pollutants, including “greenhouse gases” these nations and region are accelerating the creation of greater volumes of pollutants in an order of magnitude to America’s reductions. Perhaps if the gas bags in California focused on Beijing, New Delhi, and Mexico City some progress might be had.

Be that as it may, whatever contribution that global warming had to the fires in Los Angeles (or for that matter Northern California and all of Oregon) the actions of state and local government have outpaced global warning in terms of the breadth and intensity of these “natural” disasters. (I watched a Saturday morning news conference with Los Angeles public officials who spent most of their time congratulating each other on how well they did in organizing after the fires had burned, but little time on why they had failed. I also note that neither Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass (D) nor Los Angeles Fire Chief Kristin Crowley were present at the news conference because they are too involved in pointing fingers at each other.) The reservoirs were dry, the fire hydrants empty, the man power was short due to budget cuts, as those in charge focused on all things of “societal reform” – homeless shelters, drug user assistance, transgender support for school children, care for illegal immigrants, resisting newly elected President Donald Trump, the plight of Africa, and so on and so on. DEI was declared to be a top priority and apparently at the expense of funding, staffing and training the fire department.

And they were supported by America’s deteriorating President Joe Biden (D) who, clueless as ever, spent most of his time instructing members of his administration to “fire away” when addressing the crises. However, those who pretend to be Mr. Biden – those who actually make the decisions, craft the memos and power the teleprompters for Mr. Biden to read without comprehension and demand more use the government’s money to reward their friends, promote their causes and avoid responsibility, promptly guided Mr. Biden to his response. According to ABC News:

President Joe Biden on Thursday announced the federal government would cover 100% of costs for the initial disaster response to the Los Angeles wildfires.

Meeting with federal officials at the White House, Biden said the funds would go toward debris removal, temporary shelters, salaries for first responders and more for 180 days.

Biden said he emphasized to California officials they should ‘spare no expense to do what they need to do.’”

But just a darn minute. That isn’t Mr. Biden’s money, it is ours. He’s on his way out the door and, as in the past, he doesn’t give a damn about how the money is spent. The only thing that is important to Mr. Biden is the announcement, the ensuing headlines, and the fawning adulation from the likes of ABC News about what a great and insightful leader he is. It makes you want to throw up in the toilet. We also know that for a very wealthy man, Mr. Biden is a cheap skate when it comes to donating any of his own wealth to the well being of others through charities. A September 12, 2008, article by ABC noted:

“Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden and his wife gave an average of $369 a year to charity during the past decade, his tax records show.

“Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s campaign today released 10 years’ worth of tax returns for Biden, a senator from Delaware, and his wife Jill, a community college instructor. The Bidens reported earning $319,853 last year, including $71,000 in royalties for his memoir, Promises to Keep: On Life and Politics.

“The Bidens reported giving $995 in charitable donations last year — about 0.3% of their income and the highest amount in the past decade. The low was $120 in 1999, about 0.1% of yearly income.”

After being embarrassed by the public disclosure of his cheapness, Mr. Biden’s subsequent financial disclosure ticked up mildly although by this time, given his penchant for corruption, it is difficult to know who actually provided the funds for such charitable giving – remember Hunter’s sugar daddy paid for his back taxes and penalties. But when it comes to spending taxpayer money there is no equal. If this was actually Mr. Biden’s money we were discussing you can rest assured that the volume would be in the four digit range – not the $60-100 Billion range that it being tossed about.

He cares not for the total amount committed, the actual purposes for which it is used, or the safeguards to prevent yet another round of fraud, abuse and theft. For Mr. Biden it is all about the press release, the speech, the photographs and the publicity and nothing about the actual, proper and prudent management of assisting. Please note that the one group that was left out of Mr. Biden’s grandiose gesture were the homeowners who lost everything.

Remember, according to an investigation by the Associated Press and dated June 23, 2023:

“The story began with a simple question posed by Acting Global Investigations Editor Alison Kodjak during a January meeting: “How much COVID-19 relief money was stolen?” What followed was an investigation by multiple teams to document how much of the federal government’s $4.2 trillion (about $13,000 per person in the U.S.) in COVID-19 relief aid was looted or misspent — the first such analysis by a news organization.

“Because there is no central database tracking such fraud across so many different government agencies, global investigations reporter Richard Lardner, climate reporter Jennifer McDermott and data team reporter Aaron Kessler spent months conducting scores of interviews, reading dozens of government indictments and reports and tracking down experts. In the end, they determined that scam artists potentially stole more than $280 billion in COVID-19 relief funding, and another $123 billion was wasted or misspent. Combined, the loss represents 10% of the COVID relief aid the U.S. government has so far disbursed. Senior video producer Jeannie Ohm and motion graphics designer Eva Malek created an animated video explainer, narrated by Kessler, that succinctly laid out how easy it was for fraudsters to make off with so much money. Multimedia editor Kevin Vineys produced a series of compelling graphics that helped break down government spending and potential theft.”

Those sums do not include funds that were meant for upgrading school infrastructure but were used instead for unwarranted salary increases and new hires by various school districts. The net effect of this was that “one-time” federal grants were used to increase recurring expenses and thus burdened taxpayers annually for the foreseeable future. It was the moral equivalent of opening your bank account for an annual draw that increased via cost of living increases ad infinitum.

All of this was caused by a remarkable lack of concern about how the money was spent and whether it served its intended purposes. And the same is true for Mr. Biden’s grandiose gesture. It’s what happens when politicians become addicted to OPM – pronounced opium and stands for Other People’s Money.

Mr. Biden’s “commitment” reeks of lessons never learned by liberals and progressives – throwing money at a problem seldom solves the problem. You cannot solve a drug addiction problem by giving addicts free needles and a “sanctuary” to shoot up. You cannot solve a homeless crises by giving tents to those who prefer to live on the streets (where the drugs and alcohol are). You cannot reduce the violence in the Middle East by providing funds to the Islamic terrorists. And you cannot promote economic development by withholding needed water, to “protect” a trash fish that is universally available throughout the world in order for California’s environmental fringe to feel virtuous. Most importantly, you cannot address a problem until you recognize that it does not exist in a vacuum – such decisions have the dire consequences of those ignorant enough to believe otherwise.

But Mr. Biden is on his way out and with him the irresponsibility of spending taxpayer money. There is a new administration headed by President Donald Trump and he has promised real reform on how the government serves the people – as opposed to Mr. Biden’s rules about how the people should serve the government. Regardless, following are some suggestions about the standards by which the federal government should respond to the undeniable needs of those devastated by fires of Los Angeles:

1. The federal government should provide only matching funds to the state and local government in California. California’s state and local governments may not have started the fires or made the Santa Ana winds blow but they sure did their damnest to enhance the condition of the tinder and the lack of resources for fires they knew would burn If the federal government shoulders the primary burden for recovery it will allow the California state government to divert their funds to continue the madness that has enveloped California for the past three decades and avoid the consequences of their own failures. California government has to put their skin in this game. My suggestion is that the federal government use a 1:1 match on federal grants.

2. That the funds should be restricted to rebuilding and improving the infrastructure damaged and destroyed by the fires and to provide assistance in clearing and cleaning the forests and public lands of the brush that fuels the fires. No funds should be available for recurring expenses – salaries, benefits, utility payments, new hires or new programs. (Let’s remember the number of school districts that used COVID funds meant for dealing with HVAC systems that were diverted to salary and benefit increases, particularly in those state where the public employee unions dominate the funding of Democrat politicians.

3. The federal government should avoid dictating the relief process but should act promptly and prudently with regard to approving any expenditure. You do not want to give the government of California – especially under the current leadership – carte blanche on the use of federal funds, if for no other reason than respect for the constitutional notion that America is a “federation of states” each responsible for their own governance, you should not seek to take over their responsibility to fix the problem.

4. And finally, the whole process should be subject to a periodic “audit” or review so as to discourage fraud and abuse and hold those who try accountable. In Montana where I practiced law in the 70’s and 80’s, state agencies where subject to a “sunset” audit on a five year rotating basis to identify, remedy and/or terminate agencies and functions that failed to accomplish necessary goals. The same should hold true for this venture – and, quite frankly, for the federal government as a whole.

As a generous nation we owe the people of California the resources to rebuild from the natural disaster, but in doing so we need to ensure that those responsible for worsening its effects are held accountable. Wokeness will only die when it is deprived of access to government funding.