Replacing what works with what sounds good. Why the LA infernos

Click above for the video (just one of very many on the LA fires)

Words of wisdom from the great Thomas Sowell: 

Much of the social history of the Western world over the past three decades has involved replacing what worked with what sounded good.

"Replacing what works with what sounds good". 

Let's try it with the LA fires that are currently devastating the city.  LA, a city where close relatives have lived for years. Where we have many friends. Now burning. 10,000 houses destroyed. 40,000 people without a home. Many uninsured, because... well,, we'll get to that. 5 dead. 100s injured. Plenty of coverage out there. 

Here I just want to look at why. Why this? What might have been done differently? Was it avoidable? Short answer: yes. Because it was predicable, and anything predictable can be avoided. Just that it was not. Why? 

Largely because California replaced what works, with what sounds good but doesn't work.  

Let's see:

Fire breaks

• What works: fire breaks. This used to happen around LA until the 1980s. It kept fires at bay. As Dr Drew describes.  The forests were "criss-crossed by fire breaks'. James Woods (who lost his house) describes how a forest fire in the state of Washington burnt madly up to the Canadian border and stopped. Why? Because the Canadians had fire breaks, but WA didn't. 
• What sounds good: we must stop making fire breaks to save the migratory patterns of a mouse. That happened. Then we saved other animals by not cutting fire breaks. Sounds good right? But then another Sowell quote kicks in: "There are no solutions; only trade offs". The trade-off for saving these wild animals is more forest fires. For some, this may be worth it. For many more others, not. 

Brush cutting

• What works: clear the brush in the forests and on private homes. 
• What sounds good: leave the brush in the forests for the little animals. Again, definitely sounds good and is likely even actual good. Again: there's the "no solutions, only trade-offs" issue. What worked: City officials used to check if private homes cleared the brush on their land. What sounds good: now those city officials have been diverted to going after illegally parked vehicles. Sounds good for other car users. Not so good for the brush-clearance program. 

Water management

• What works: Dams and reservoirs. 
• What sounds good: destroy dams to save the salmon and pike and smelt. Again... no solutions only trade-offs. With the nice-sounding fish-preservation, you have greater danger for the public and property. What definitely doesn't work: closing for maintenance a major LA reservoir right before the major fire season, as happened with the Pasadena reservoir which normally holds the equivalent of 200 olympic sized swimming pools of water. Because it was empty, the fire hydrants in Pasadena didn't work. 

(On this hydrant issue, we heard first that the hydrants were not pumping water. Then we heard from authorities, including Joe Biden, that this was "right-wing misinformation", only to have the CA Governor Gavin Newsome, finally admit that yes, there was indeed a problem with empty hydrants, and he would "institute an enquiry". Thanks Gav.)

Capable emergency services

• What works: getting the best and most qualified to staff the emergency services. 
• What sounds good: We want more gender equality. More LGBTQ staff. More intersectionality. More Diversity Equity and Inclusion. But... are we getting the best? In many cases, clearly not. 

Insuring Homes

• What works: encouraging home-insurance companies to stay in California. By mitigating risks, especially fire risk.
• What sounds good: telling insurance companies they must insure homes in CA, even as the risks of fire escalate. Result: insurance companies decide to leave CA, rather than have to face unacceptable risks. Many of the homes destroyed by fire are uninsured, because they became uninsurable. Thanks to the CA government, of Gavin Newsome. 

Choose your mayor (and your Governor) wisely

• What works: choosing a mayor on the basis of skill, experience, competence.
• What sounds good: choosing a mayor based on sex and skin colour. I know a number of liberals in LA who said openly and proudly that they couldn't vote for the "white guy", despite his huge experience at construction and management, but could Karen Bass, because she's a woman of colour. And so we get the incompetence that is on clear display. Together with the incompetence at the head of the LA Fire Department, whose 3 top officials are lesbians and WOCs. 

So, in sum: the whole thing with all the problems, pretty much all, is down to ceasing to do things that work and doing instead things that sound good. 

Many of them sound so good, I could buy into them myself, or at least my younger self could. Things like saving the salmon in a river by destroying the dams, to give them free run of the river. But then I also buy into the other quote from Sowell; That there are no solutions only trade offs. You destroy dams as  "solution" for the salmon and the trade-off is people suffer. And I'm also not so sure that there couldn't be other ways to save the salmon: like have spillways and diversions, for example. 

The biggest issue in the management of LA is in choosing the Mayor. Where heaps of people -- the majority -- decided that they would vote for something that sounded nice (a minority Woman of Colour), instead of something that would work (an experienced businessman developer). 

Crazy but true. 

Have a look at the qualifications of Karen Bass, the current mayor, and those of her opponent, Rick Caruso below. 

LA people chose Bass because of identity politics.  I know which I'd prefer. Caruso is a billionaire. That means he has to spend less time on the tawdry task of fund-raising. It also means he doesn't do the job because he needs it. Give me a successful property developer any time, vs someone who's only ever held a government job. But Angelinos chose Bass. Because. Minority of Colour. 

From Here:

• Karen Bass, U.S. Representative from California's 37th congressional district and former Speaker of the California State Assembly^[7][8]
• Rick Caruso, CEO of Caruso Affiliated, developer of The Grove at Farmers Market and The Americana at Brand, president of the University of Southern California board of trustees, former president of the Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners, and former member of the Los Angeles Board of Water and Power and the Los Angeles Coliseum Commission^[9]

BTW: Home-owner responsibility

If I lived in LA I would be aware of the annual fires. Every year at this time they are fanned by the infamous Santa Ana winds. They've been around forever. And if they've got worse because of Climate Change, that's only all the more reason to Do Things That Work, instead of things-that-sound-nice. 

I would know that. So I'd have a Grab Bag, as we do on a yacht. In the Grab Bag: you keep your Passport, ID card, valuables, some clothing, ready to go. I would install a fireproof and looter-proof hideaway in my house, a Safe Storage to store other valuables, like photo albums, paintings, jewelry, and any other stuff that you'd hate to lose. Make is so that if the house burns down, you have your most cherished items somewhere safe, either in your Grab Bag or in the Safe Storage. 

References:

• Drew Pinski. talk with Dave Rubin
• James Wood, talk with Megyn Kelly
• Adam Carolla talks about his evacuation from his condo in Santa Monica
• Victory Davis Hanson: says: the fires are a Green New Deal/DEI "hydrogen bomb"

I've watched a lot of CNN. What they've done is to report on the fires. Which is fine. What they've put out of bounds is discussing who might be responsible and why. Because it would reflect badly on the very Blue Democratic government of California, an effective one-party state. Must protect.