By New York Post (Opinion) | Created at 2025-01-14 21:38:15 | Updated at 2025-01-18 08:06:56
3 days ago
The Issue: The actions of Gov. Gavin Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass in response to raging wildfires.
The abject failure that we are witnessing on so many levels of basic leadership in Los Angeles is revealing (“Seeing red at blue ruin,” Editorial, Jan. 12).
Politicians, particularly those in deep-blue machine cities and states, do not represent the interests of their constituents. They are beholden to the donors who pay for the ads that convince people to vote for them.
President-elect Donald Trump’s popular-vote victory was a sign that voters around the country are getting wise to this corruption.
But he only got 38% of the vote in deep-blue California. Now, Californians are (as the saying goes) being “mugged by reality.”
I suspect this fire is the beginning of the end for the Democrats’ dominance in California. That is a good thing for the nation. Per another saying, “as California goes, so goes the country.”
Rob Grien
West Stockbridge, Mass.
The devastation to homes, businesses and schools in Los Angeles County amid the California wildfires is virtually impossible to comprehend. What we do know, however, is that destruction knows no bounds and makes no distinction between the haves and have-nots.
The annihilation of elite neighborhoods in Pacific Palisades and Malibu came as a shocking wake-up call to the privileged class of people otherwise rarely affected by the progressive policies they so ardently defend.
If Hollywood liberals finally recognize the error of their ways and turn on the Democratic machine to save the state, then perhaps a silver lining can be found in the dark cloud of despair that now hangs over California.
Jack Kaufman
Naples, Fla.
Shame on anyone who has politicized the fires in California.
They are constantly referring to the $50 billion cost of the fires. Well, Hurricane Milton in Florida also cost $50 billion, and I don’t see you blaming Gov. Ron DeSantis.
He had over a week’s notice to prepare and a water shortage during the hurricane. I never saw the Democrats politicizing it, but rather focusing on the people and how to help them.
Shame on those who are making political hay out of this tragedy.
Raymond Mangano
Brooklyn
This is not southern California’s first wildfire. But the Democratic politicians in charge — Newsom and the mostly Democratic Legislature — are incapable of responsibly running the state during the tragedy.
All that these progressives know is virtue-signaling and blindly following woke ideology. It seems they actually want large wildfires, so they can blame them on climate change.
They are not capable of course correction, even when their policies are clearly shown to be disasters.
As long as leaders don’t care about proper forest management or capturing water runoff from the northern part of the state, but obsess about a small fish that nobody’s heard of, then California will continue to have terrible tragedies like this.
Edward J. Cooper
Glenmont
Both New York and California are run by Democrats. Both states are very similar when it comes to homelessness, increased crime, high taxes, disgraceful educational results, inability to fix infrastructural problems, high utility costs and more.
If and when the people wake up, they will vote Gov. Hochul, Mayor Adams, Gov. Gavin Newsom, Mayor Karen Bass and their ilk out of office — plus all the lefty City Council members and educators along with them.
The question is: When will the people wake up?
Larry Hootnick
Watermill
A few months after Bass cut $17 million from the budget for the Fire Department, she left town to attend an inauguration in Ghana. This comes after LA voters recalled their do-nothing district attorney; they are now making major noise about getting rid of Bass.
Sadly, voters reap what they sow by continuing to elect these Democrats. Wake up, New York — it’s happening here too!
Rob Cerone
Manhattan
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