Paradise Burning

13 snips

Feb 5, 2025

The podcast dives into the recent catastrophic wildfires in L.A., highlighting the incompetence of local officials amidst predictable disasters. It contrasts California's glorious past with its current challenges. The vibrant history of Haight-Ashbury is explored, showcasing the rise of the hippie movement alongside its darker realities. Political shifts, from bipartisanship to a Democratic stronghold, are discussed, revealing how changes in governance have affected public services and urgency in crises. Finally, the narrative calls for reflection on California's future.

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ANECDOTE

Milk Vetch Incident

A botanist halted fire prevention efforts in the Palisades to save a rare milk vetch.
This exemplifies how noble intentions can lead to disastrous outcomes in California politics.

INSIGHT

Predictable Disaster

The recent L.A. fires were a predictable disaster, worsened by Californian incompetence.
The fires highlight a deeper rot within the Golden State.

INSIGHT

California's Legacy

California's history is rich with innovation and cultural influence, shaping the American dream.
Surrendering California means surrendering that dream.

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Last month, L.A. burned. It was one of the most predictable disasters on record. A century of development on land whose ecosystems were forged in wildfire; years of increasingly regular blazes; months of low rainfall. The National Weather Service even issued an explicit warning: This was coming.

Unfortunately, when Chekhov’s fire arrived, everything that could go wrong, did. A key reservoir was being repaired when the blazes began. The hydrants didn’t have enough pressure. The state hadn’t cleared the dry vegetation near the hills of the Palisades and Malibu that is kindling for the seasonal wildfires. L.A. mayor Karen Bass didn’t have much to say to the citizens. You can’t blame local officials for the weather, but it seemed to most observers that Bass and Governor Gavin Newsom had created their own perfect storm of Californian incompetence.

Something has gone wrong. The fires are indicative of something rotten in the Golden State.

But it wasn’t always this way. California was once a place where industry and imagination locked arms and showed us how great the human experiment could be. It secured democracy by manufacturing the weapons that won World War II. It built the dream factory of Hollywood; it gave us Silicon Valley and personal computing. It gave us Dr. Dre and Dr. Strangelove. Without California there are no hippies, no tech bros, no gangsters in our rap music, no hardcore in our punk, no Boys on our Beach, and no movie stars.

In other words: When we surrender California, we surrender the dreams that built the American century.

To understand how and why California surrendered, we have to travel back to the 1970s—a decade of despair and decadence, not just for L.A., but especially for San Francisco, as it became the petri dish for the values that now define the state’s politics and governance. It is a story of sex, drugs, scandal, and terror, and to understand how Democrats began to accommodate a radical left that has burrowed deeply into the state’s bureaucracy, courts, and political machines, the revolution of the San Fran ’70s explains a lot.

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