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California WTF? A rant.

joko104 said:
I suspect lots and lots of people would like to leave California for the reason you gave and other reasons, but can not for lack of money to do so, stuck there by their job or stuck their by family connections. Also, it does have a desirable climate and a person can become accustomed to the climate and community they are in.

So, instead, you just have to hope it won't just keep getting worse and doesn't affect you personally too much. Any person on the wrong side of a social revolution will feel that way - and you are trapped on the wrong side within a clear social revolution in California - whether you like it or not. To various degrees, much of the country now is.

The progressive socialist Democrat agenda, combined with being directed by the international super rich towards corporate fascism are very serious and their number is swelling, while largely entrenched within government and the corporate world. It is a real struggle for preservation of the USA as it has been versus being turned into a corporate-fascist country at all institutional levels. A complete revolution ala Mein Kampf.
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/// A complete revolution ala Mein Kampf. /// :2rofll:
 
Checkerboard Strangler said:
If you're going to spend money to build and set up "workhouses" how does that help homeless who are already working?
Why not use that money to just build affordable housing instead?
Some can be temporary, some can be semi-permanent, all can be predicated on the notion that the occupant couldn't afford housing elsewhere, and once they can, they have to secure a new place and move into it thus opening a vacancy for another wh was in the same situation.

See, you like many others, don't understand that one third to one half the homeless actually do earn money.
Some even have regular jobs.
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What happens is the value of the residence will still outpace what low income working people can afford. For example, the "brown bricks" of Harlem were low income housing, but little of it still is. Some are moderate size condos selling for $300,000 and up. Small ones nearly $200,000. Rents start about $2000 a month.

That just happens. However, since there is more profit now in just starting with higher income/price units, the developer realizes greater profit with less hassles than managing low income rental or condo housing.
 
EMNofSeattle said:
Why in poorer countries are there fewer and less violently aggressive homeless people?
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Gee, maybe because the cops roust them more, maybe because family structure is stronger, with the mentally ill not alienated tossed out, cause housing is cheaper, etc. But check out the slums that ring Mexico City or São Paulo. No different than the tents where I live in Berkeley.

As to the LA question, heard a long time ago that misfits in the US move west. Some make it, some don’t. Better to be homeless in January in LA than in Cleveland. As George Carlin used to riff, they are not homeless, they are houseless. His suggestion: take over land that isnt used much, e.g., golf courses. All it is used for is guys in tasteless clothing to hit a ball that isn’t even moving. And they hardly move either. I can see it now: low cost housing in the areas between the fairways.
 
Nickyjo said:
Gee, maybe because the cops roust them more, maybe because family structure is stronger, with the mentally ill not alienated tossed out, cause housing is cheaper, etc. But check out the slums that ring Mexico City or São Paulo. No different than the tents where I live in Berkeley.

As to the LA question, heard a long time ago that misfits in the US move west. Some make it, some don’t. Better to be homeless in January in LA than in Cleveland. As George Carlin used to riff, they are not homeless, they are houseless. His suggestion: take over land that isnt used much, e.g., golf courses. All it is used for is guys in tasteless clothing to hit a ball that isn’t even moving. And they hardly move either. I can see it now: low cost housing in the areas between the fairways.
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"Take over golf courses."

Yeah, just go "take over" those golf courses in NYC, particularly Manhattan, Harlem and the Bronx. Just take them over and build lots and lots of low income 10 story buildings for the poor and homeless.

Setting aside the "take over" part of that, where, exactly, are those golf courses? Sounds like a "run those poor people and bums out of the city" plan. Put them out in the suburbs, not near us in the city.
 
joko104 said:
What happens is the value of the residence will still outpace what low income working people can afford. For example, the "brown bricks" of Harlem were low income housing, but little of it still is. Some are moderate size condos selling for $300,000 and up. Small ones nearly $200,000. Rents start about $2000 a month.

That just happens. However, since there is more profit now in just starting with higher income/price units, the developer realizes greater profit with less hassles than managing low income rental or condo housing.
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Dude I lived in New York. It took decades before the Brownstones picked up value, and by the way, that's what they're called, okay?
And they weren't just in Harlem, which by the way I question your mental image of Harlem but that's for another thread.
I can just imagine you figure it's Compton California.

What's needed in many parts of California is a large supply of tiny 100-300 square foot efficiency apartments, trailer homes and "tiny houses". The different housing types can be put in different areas but the more the merrier.

Apartments in Los Angeles CAN be HAD for as low as 550 a month, but they're exceedingly rare. Every week one or two show up on Zillow and it's not always in bad areas, and sometimes they're pretty nice places.
It's just that there's only one or two a week.

If we could have fifty available a month, with subsidy programs to help people get the deposit together, if one or two people both have jobs, they could make it work.
And it would be cheaper than what we're doing now. It's been proven in places like Salt Lake City.
 
joko104 said:
"Take over golf courses."

Yeah, just go "take over" those golf courses in NYC, particularly Manhattan, Harlem and the Bronx. Just take them over and build lots and lots of low income 10 story buildings for the poor and homeless.

Setting aside the "take over" part of that, where, exactly, are those golf courses? Sounds like a "run those poor people and bums out of the city" plan. Put them out in the suburbs, not near us in the city.
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It was Carlin’s joke, not mine. Take it up with him on the other side.
 
Grand Mal said:
What's the point of a law that incarcerates homeless people? What's the point of locking them up? Punishment? Rehabilitation? I'll tell you what the point is. Get them out of sight, that's the point.
Tell me something- what's the cause of homelessness in warm climate cities? I know one contributing factor. If you're in charge in a cold winter place just make life so uncomfortable for homeless people that they'll migrate to southern California and you can crow about how liberalism causes a homeless problem. Hell, if conservatives get control nation-wide those homeless people can be kept shuffleing along the highways and locked up wherever they try to settle. Who cares about solutions? Solutions are too complicated, they usually cost money and only liberals care about solving problems anyway.
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Well, California’s about as liberal, right? Why haven’t they solved the problem? Come to think of it, what current problem has liberalism actually improved?
 
justabubba said:
because there are no deplorable republican trailer trash there expecting a handout
is my guess
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I can only imagine the hell I’d catch if I called the people I saw “trash.” My brother lives in a trailer but I don’t think he’s Republican. He has been on public assistance before but isn’t now, I don’t think. I haven’t talked to him a few years now, though I have tried. It is true that he has had financial difficulty before and that is largely due to poor and short sighted decision making on his part.
 
X Factor said:
Well, California’s about as liberal, right? Why haven’t they solved the problem? Come to think of it, what current problem has liberalism actually improved?
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How about various social issues that LGBT face, by implimenting protections from things like job discrimination? Certainly helps when you can't get fired from your job or denied housing for being gay. Can't ever expect (most) conservative lawmakers to get behind any of that, really.
 
TheGoverness said:
How about various social issues that LGBT face, by implimenting protections from things like job discrimination? Certainly helps when you can't get fired from your job or denied housing for being gay. Can't ever expect (most) conservative lawmakers to get behind any of that, really.
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After I asked that question, I thought about it. Our city leaders are Democrats that would very much like El Paso to be California, so they’ve gone about the business of adding some very nice parks and bike paths, restoring our San Jacinto Plaza and Plaza Theater, building a AAA baseball park (we are the mighty Chihuahuas) and bringing back our old street cars. Despite the grumbling of tightwads like me, these things have improved life here, for real. Still, even here, there is enough residual Texas attitude that people would not be allowed to live in cardboard boxes in the doorway of the county courthouse or park shopping carts on sidewalks or given license to take a dump in the street or pitch a tent in one of these nice new parks and live there. It’s just possible that a mix of liberalism and conservatism is actually better than either side just having their own way without challenge.
 
X Factor said:
I spent the day in Los Angeles yesterday for a convention and, to be real, it wasn’t pretty at all. I had heard about human feces and trash in the streets but I thought that was exaggerated and hey, every city has their “bad” neighborhoods. Just in the drive to and from the venue, which was about an hour from LAX, I saw more than just some litter on the ground. I saw dozens of stuffed shopping carts blocking the sidewalks, people with giant bags of cans walking casually through traffic, drivers being hit up for spare change while waiting in line at a drive through, campsites and cardboard dwellings in virtually every open space along the freeway, tents pitched in the doorways of buildings and even streets lined with derelict, trashed out RVs (that **** would be towed away where I live).

No doubt, there are very nice areas of LA, much nicer than anything we have we live. I think, though, what I saw is an extreme example of what happens when you divorce people from any accountability for their lives and choices and, instead, place blame those who do work to take care of themselves. It actually isn’t selfish to take care of yourself so others don’t have to take care of you. Compassion is a great thing and we need social safety nets but compassion without some responsibility is just enabling and I don’t think anything I saw was beneficial to anyone.

/end rant
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But ... those are California values.

"California’s values aren’t just a point of pride; they are the very fabric of the state’s history and our future. ... He believes that California has a responsibility and opportunity to show the country and the world what inclusive, progressive government can achieve." - Gavin Newsome, Governor of California
 
bubbabgone said:
But ... those are California values.

"California’s values aren’t just a point of pride; they are the very fabric of the state’s history and our future. ... He believes that California has a responsibility and opportunity to show the country and the world what inclusive, progressive government can achieve." - Gavin Newsome, Governor of California
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Well I’m definitely watching.
 
Checkerboard Strangler said:
What has ALSO strangled affordable housing is outsized demand and the fact that enormous amounts of housing were bought up by an investor class, an investor class that has a habit of making buildings uninhabitable to push out undesirable tenants, also known as poor people.

Landlords in Los Angeles Are Allegedly Making Buildings Uninhabitable to Push Out Poor People



As to refusal to rezone land, I agree that LA should follow San Diego's lead on this.
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Again, what is the attraction to keep voting democrat when your city is gradually becoming unlivable?
 
X Factor said:
I spent the day in Los Angeles yesterday for a convention and, to be real, it wasn’t pretty at all. I had heard about human feces and trash in the streets but I thought that was exaggerated and hey, every city has their “bad” neighborhoods. Just in the drive to and from the venue, which was about an hour from LAX, I saw more than just some litter on the ground. I saw dozens of stuffed shopping carts blocking the sidewalks, people with giant bags of cans walking casually through traffic, drivers being hit up for spare change while waiting in line at a drive through, campsites and cardboard dwellings in virtually every open space along the freeway, tents pitched in the doorways of buildings and even streets lined with derelict, trashed out RVs (that **** would be towed away where I live).

No doubt, there are very nice areas of LA, much nicer than anything we have we live. I think, though, what I saw is an extreme example of what happens when you divorce people from any accountability for their lives and choices and, instead, place blame those who do work to take care of themselves. It actually isn’t selfish to take care of yourself so others don’t have to take care of you. Compassion is a great thing and we need social safety nets but compassion without some responsibility is just enabling and I don’t think anything I saw was beneficial to anyone.

/end rant
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Huh. Doesn't really sound like you're actually thinking. No one, literally no one, is claiming what you saw is 'beneficial'.

Except, perhaps, rabid conservatives who want to compel these people to live with the choices they made. Doing otherwise would be socialism, and nobody wants THAT.
 
chuckiechan said:
Again, what is the attraction to keep voting democrat when your city is gradually becoming unlivable?
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Sorry if you're disappointed that I am not buying the myth that "Democrats = unlivable" as I've already lived under both Republicans and Democrats in CA.
 
Grand Mal said:
All the best places in the world to live are liberal/progressive/leftist utopias.
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Just as long as you don't step in it and get it on you shoes, I guess.

Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk
 
eohrnberger said:
Just as long as you don't step in it and get it on you shoes, I guess.

Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk
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Liberalism works just fine all around the world.
Just because you can't do something doesn't mean it can't be done.
 
Grand Mal said:
Liberalism works just fine all around the world.
Just because you can't do something doesn't mean it can't be done.
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The new Democratic Party isn't liberal, it is "progressive" - meaning corporate fascism for which Democratic candidates now are having a contest of which one can offer more welfare to the super rich and super rich corporations by promising massive subsidizing of their employees, total defense of their foreign child labor sweatshops, and to pay for their rich kid's college educations - colleges working people would never be admitted to for lack of connections the super rich have.
 
beefheart said:
Like anywhere, it all depends where you are. I never have any issues in LA when I go there. All depends on your neighborhood, its still a great city there are many wonderful US and world cities that have the same issues, you just need a bigger view of all the good stuff, instead of focusing on the bad stuff.
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I see this argument used a lot, but it seems to come from people who don't seem to understand that absolutrely NO, not every city has **** in the streets, shanty towns and the rest. No, that isn't normal.

Saying that LA is fine because you can find places that, I assume, don't allow the homeless, is a "let them eat cake" moment.
 
Casper said:
But if they are living on the streets isn't that them being held accountable?
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Bingo. If the idea is that homeless people should not be helped because helping them encourages homelessness, then the very presence of homeless people proves that they are being held accountable. But wait, that is not enough for the really cruel people out there. They must not only be homeless but have no place to defecate, no food, no health service if hurt, nothing. Because if you collectively ignore them or make their lives as miserable as possible, they will all find jobs and turn into little productive Americans. The absurdity of this line of thinking cannot be overstated.
 
Vadinho said:
Bingo. If the idea is that homeless people should not be helped because helping them encourages homelessness, then the very presence of homeless people proves that they are being held accountable. But wait, that is not enough for the really cruel people out there. They must not only be homeless but have no place to defecate, no food, no health service if hurt, nothing. Because if you collectively ignore them or make their lives as miserable as possible, they will all find jobs and turn into little productive Americans. The absurdity of this line of thinking cannot be overstated.
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Then why do Californians vote for Democrats who do exactly what you whine about? Why do they sob over illegal migrant children while not giving a damn about American homeless children?
 
joko104 said:
Then why do Californians vote for Democrats who do exactly what you whine about? Why do they sob over illegal migrant children while not giving a damn about American homeless children?
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We spend millions on homeless people and their kids. The flow from other states is endless. Is this an attempt at an adult conversation?
 
Grand Mal said:
Liberalism works just fine all around the world.
Just because you can't do something doesn't mean it can't be done.
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It would seem that liberal mayors in large cities implementing liberal policies can't seem to keep the streets clear of human excrement and used hypodermic needles from drug abusers.
 
eohrnberger said:
It would seem that liberal mayors in large cities implementing liberal policies can't seem to keep the streets clear of human excrement and used hypodermic needles from drug abusers.
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Like I said, just because you can't do something...
 
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