Democrats Fiddle While L.A. Burns
Nero, Bass, and the collapse of governance in Los Angeles is emblematic of Democrat's failures.
Roman Emperor Nero could only have dreamt of being as out of touch with the “peasantry” as Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. Nero, for his credit, actually watched Rome burn from his palace. Bass took a tropical vacation to Ghana, while Los Angeles was torn asunder.
Ghana’s critical importance to Los Angeles remains unseen, but for us peasant folk, we are not capable of understanding the multifaceted mind of Bass and the Democratic Party elite. The people of Los Angeles do not seem to understand either as they criticize and question their duly selected commissar.
Expecting water in your fire hydrants or firefighters who can lift a two hundred pound man are bourgeois questions that can only come from the problematic privileged middle class. These concerns must be ignored and put aside. The tastemakers at the DNC think it is far more important to attend the Ghanaian inauguration to virtue signal rather than to govern. At least California’s Governor Newsom was in state, but he too failed at answering questions or effectively managing the fires.
Los Angeles has been dominated by Democrats for decades and is a hub of cultural output in the United States. Conservatives are aware of the callous attitude of many Democrat officials and elites, especially after East Palestine, Ohio, where we saw the left ignore the incident which damaged the lives of so many hard-working Americans.
Democrats have always looked down on rural and middle Americans as lacking culture and not being sufficiently educated in having acceptable opinions about social issues, what they refer to as “backwards.”
Los Angeles, however, is the City of Angels both literally and figuratively for the left. Sweeping motifs about artists and the enlightened people of Hollywood have been strewn about for years by party apparatchiks. Los Angeles is dominated and run by the forces of the Cultural Revolution, so why do they not care about the fires and their own people? The answer is simple, they do not know how to care anymore.
Being in power for the left is not about governing anymore. The common good as a concept is forgotten. The only use for the political agents of the Democrat Party for office is to advance the revolutionary cultural agenda. Stopping forest fires is not a part of that process.
This phenomenon has existed for a long time but is now endemic. The left does not care about good governance. Vacations to Ghana and DEI in the firehouse matter far more than the mere wellbeing of your citizens. They do not feel obligated to serve the people of Los Angeles because they do not answer to them. They answer to party bosses and elites who have an agenda that does not include the American people.
President Trump has rightly pointed out the incompetence of these leaders. It is clear that upon taking office next week, he will have to do what he does best: solve problems. This time, it will be cleaning up the Democrat’s mess. Yet, the fires are emblematic of a larger question: Is it time for the federal government to exercise greater administration over America’s failed cities, all of which are run by Democrats? Perhaps this could be the impetus for Trump’s “Freedom Cities.” At a minimum, the citizens of Los Angeles need to reevaluate their leadership. Will they, however?
In a city like Los Angeles, where elections are rarely competitive, this will be an interesting test for the left and the voters as a whole. If one party through its own negligence or incompetence allows your home to burn to the ground without apology, will you still vote for them come election day?
How capable are the Democratic Party rank and file voters who may despise Trump or disagree with Republicans on the national level of bucking their ideological hangups to vote out a mayor who simply does a terrible job? How willing are voters to put aside their mostly abstract notions of ideology to vote for someone who won’t let the city burn down? That is the bare minimum of governance.
We will have to see, but do not hold your breath. Nero built the grandest palace in the world after his great fire and blamed Christians for the episode. Will the Democrats be able to find a scapegoat to distract the public or are they outweighed in competency by even history’s worst leaders?
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This is a major problem in major cities across the nation. Too many people in these metropolitan areas vote on a hardline ideological, sometimes even racial basis that it makes electing competent urban leaders a Herculean task.
"How capable are the Democratic Party rank and file voters who may despise Trump or disagree with Republicans on the national level of bucking their ideological hangups to vote out a mayor who simply does a terrible job?" The saddest part is that if they do oust her, they’ll likely just replace her with someone equally incompetent—or, tragically, an even bigger disaster