The latest Counterpunch misstep

Will Solomon, writing at Counterpunch, was apparently impressed by Glenn Greenwald more recently than I was, and by Sam Harris far more recently than I was. I say "apparently" because it's paywalled, as that site continues to slouch toward Gomorrah. (The title is about how "tech billionaires have bought the loudest voices on left and right.) 

I would pay to read THAT?  Some Captain Obvious shit that may imply that, in years past at least, Glennwald was a leftist, too?

Beyond the likely nature of this piece, it's not the first one that's a semi-Captain Obvious one that St. Clair and Cockburn have paywalled in the last three months or so as part of getting more aggressive in general with paywalls.

Seriously, I need to get that updated blogroll done and my old one hauled down.

Joe Biden, full of shit one last time

In his "farewell address," Genocide Joe / Warmonger Joe / Wallbuilder Joe, etc. warned about a number of issues. I roasted him with some flash snark on Shitter, but wanted to go more in depth about the full reality of his outright mendaciousness.

This was the first warning of his:

“Today, an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms, and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead,” Biden said.

Really? 

Yes, your Democraps have been out-oligarchied by Rethuglicans, perhaps, but not for want of trying.

Your Veep blew through billions on her presidential campaign, went massively in debt, and will stiff every non-oligarch she can.

You yourself cut back, or rather, gutted COVID aid (just like your old boss, Dear Leader, not spending enough on the Great Recession because Rahm Emanuel said so) and other issues.

You've done nothing for national healthcare.

But, you DID have your Department of Justice pile on, with the person angry to violence about healthcare and the oligarchs who run it, Luigi Mangione, and file a federal case in addition to state charges.

Fuck off right there.

On to the rest:

The president outlined some of his most pressing concerns, including what he described as a “crumbling” free press, the outsized influence of the military-industrial complex, rising disinformation, and the need to remove dark money from politics.

Oh, you're getting your ass kicked.

"Crumbling" free press? Coming from the guy who wants to ban TikTok because he's afraid of ChiNazis, tried to get social media to self-censor and other things?

Update: Throwing Sam Husseini out of a presser with Tony Blinken is sure as hell crumbling the free press.

"Criminal! Why aren't you in The Hague," shouted Sam Husseini, an independent journalist and longtime critic of Washington's approach to the world. The Hague is where the International Criminal Court is located.

The unusually confrontational scene in the State Department briefing room only ended when security personnel forcibly picked up Husseini and carried him out of the room as he continued to heckle Blinken.

Max Blumenthal was escorted out, but without force:

"Why did you keep the bombs flowing when we had a deal in May?" Max Blumenthal, editor of the Grayzone, an outlet that strongly criticizes many aspects of U.S. foreign policy, called out to Blinken, before he was escorted out.

Yeah, self-crumbling the free press. Here's Husseini writing about it himself. And, video:

Here's Max's video.

This is, per The Nation's Jeet Heer, "ultra-hawk" Tony Blinken, surely one of the Team Biden insideres who has long known about his dementia and who ran foreign policy as an independent fiefdom like Henry Kissinger. As for Biden himself? Heer notes his fawning over Scoop Jackson:

In a 1983 eulogy on the Senate floor, Biden said that “Jackson changed a major part of my political life” by teaching him the importance of Israel to American foreign policy.

Blech. That said, the farthest left Jeet can go for people criticizing Biden's military Keynesianism is Adam Tooze.

Outsized influence of the military-industrial complex? This is Genocide Joe, the man who never met a bomb for Israel he didn't like.

Rising disinformation? 

Like when Anthony Fauci told people NOT to wear masks at the start of COVID (and went on from there)? When he claimed Peter Daszak was NOT doing gain of function research? When he himself claimed that a "red line" with Bibi Netanyahu was a red line? When he said four years ago he'd only run for one term?

Dark money in politics? Neither you nor Dear Leader tried to do any repairs to McCain-Feingold, for starters.

There is no reason for many people to die in wildfires

The Paradise Fire (Camp Fire by name, Paradise being the town) was and is a tragic exception, but let's note that — it was tragic, and it was and is an exception to what I mention in the header.

I decided to pull information I had written about the earliest reported deaths from the Palisades and Eaton fires from the roasting I had given Joshua Frank of Counterpunch to reference them separately.

On the 11 deaths recorded through Saturday afternoon? And on why they died? I'll take them in order of presentation in the story.

First, pets are not people. I know that, Robert Putnam "bowling alone" cliches aside, for more and more people living alone, they've become quasi-people. But? They're not people. And, while not talking about LA wildfires, but rather, the ice storm in his Atlanta area, Ed Buckner agrees that pets aren't people.

Second, if an amputee father told his out-of-state daughter he was going to evacuate, wouldn't that have originally included his cerebral palsy son living with him, so what changed his mind? Something happened. But, it didn't need to. He should have evacuated with his son.

Third, it wasn't in god's hands, because, per Muhammad, there is no god and I am his prophet, and unlike nutters in Tex-ass with tornadoes, nobody prayed away the fire. To be really blunt, and switch from theology to secularism? People who have a fatalistic version of "god's will" and get their asses killed in natural disasters are Darwin Award candidates. 

Fourth, in the reverse of social media rumors, don't try to fight fires like this if you're not a firefighter. Sixth is No. 4 in spades — definitely don't try to be a professional firefighter if you have cerebral palsy. Seventh, don't try to be a professional firefighter.

Fifth, why was the person talking to his family on his cellphone not self-evacuated long before? (Story doesn't explain why he stayed.)  

Someone who did not die, but was it worth the risk? It is craptacular for 90-year-olds to have their insurance cancelled, but is it worth it for a 60-ish child to risk dying, especially since you don't know that you can keep their house from burning or not? And, on this whole issue, I'm not meaning to excuse property insurers, but, per Abrahm Lustgarten, maybe insurance against both fire and hurricane needs to be less state-socialized; Lustgarten specifically noted in his book that making people feel enough pain on this aspect of climate change might actually spur action. The story linked at the top of the piece notes that Cal state regulators have allowed a bunch of insurance hikes; socialist Florida and Tex-ass refuse to do that with hurricanes. The piece also notes that the state's former insurance commissioner forced all state-operating property insurers to look at their investments in fossil fuels; unfortunately, no divestments were required.

Side note: SCOTUS is allowing state-based climate change lawsuits to proceed. Team Biden wanted this, but Team Biden has also refused to file amicus briefs let alone its own lawsuits.

Four and seven remind me of Florida hurricane nutters. This paragraph may sound callous, but, as with Florida hurricane nutters, none of these people had to die. They didn't, period and end of story.

==

The Beeb has a Jan. 13 update. In addition to the above, you have a person saying "the fire would pass over" (equivalent of act of god and/or hurricane nutters), a "fires didn't get here before" (hurricane nutters), and at least one other amateur firefighter.

==

What are best practices to prevent wildfire spread? Stephen Eisenman offers some at Counterpunch, while claiming others, such as prescribed burns, will make things worse. OK, that's good reason to have fewer rebuilds. As for "house-hardening"? That's going to push California housing costs even higher. As for, per Naked Capitalism, the slow pace of rebuilding in the Santa Monica Mountains after a 2020 fire being a harbinger for LA? Maybe most that rebuilding shouldn't happen. Move to Cleveland or St. Louis, where the water is and the wildfires are not. Counterpunch's Jeff St. Clair linked to that, and is drawing the same wrong conclusions as Joshua Frank.

Burrows as Texas House Speaker? No, not "surprised"; and is this a mess of pottage for House Dems?

Dustin Burrows was elected Texas Speaker of the House 85-55 in the second round. The Trib reports nine "present" after Ana Maria Ramos fell out after the first round. That's still one short of 150; why Yvonne Davis wasn't there, I don't know. BUT, contra the Trib, the stormtrooper followers of Christofascist Tim Dunn are NOT "insurgents." Shock me that Justin Barragán and Jasper Scherer have the bylines; they probably wrote the fucking header, too.

That said, contra Kuff, I'm not "a little surprised." (At least he had the "a little" qualifier.) Both Burrows and Cook were playing their cards close to the vest ever since the House GOP Caucus meeting last month. In the last 48 hours before the voting, both had one or two announcements of people on the wagon, but that was it. Otherwise, Burrows was of course aggressive in his claim of 76 supporters right after the caucus, even if that initially blew up in his face.

Now, the mess of pottage issue? 

Per the "blew up" link, Burrows had already said no Democrat committee chairs. He had already said he would let any vouchers bill reach the House floor. And, he was already known for 2023's "Death Star" bill sponsorship. So, unless there were some private deals we don't yet know about, what did Dems gain by not letting David Cook have the job? I already talked about that, as well as whether or not the state GOP will really censure any Burrows voters, including the new of 2024 state resolution to include a primary election ban, late last year.

Anyway, summarizing a shitload of snark I posted on Twitter yesterday? I loved the Texas exceptionalism blather coming from nomination speechifiers, including from presumed ConservaDem Toni Rose in seconding Burrows' nomination. I also loved Ana-Maria Ramos doing her best Castilian-lite Spanish in imitation of Maria Hinojosa of Latino USA.

Missed by me from the Trib? Lone Star Left says Ramos voted for Cook not Burrows in round two. Butt-hurt? I also loved Ramos seconding her own nomination. Add egotistical to butt-hurt. No wonder Dems still can't win more in the not-so-great, not-blessed-by-a-nonexistent-critter Pointy Abandoned Object State™.

Flip side? She may be right on not wanting to buy a mess of pottage that will probably be of limited benefit.

==

Update: In a folo piece by the Trib's same Bobbsey Twins, House Dems leader Gene Wu says there's a clear difference between Burrows and Wu, and even still holds out hope that Dems will, despite Burrows' previous hinted personal opposition, get to head some committees. (Burrows is now on record as saying he'll let the full House vote on the issue, but I doubt that most the Rethugs who voted for him will risk getting primaried over this.)

As for the idea he'll not shut Dems out of the House bill-making process? Yes, that's a win.

As far as the idea this keeps the House independent from Dan Patrick? Yes, that's a win.

Otherwise? Nothing new and move along.

If the MSM is dying, so too will, or should, certain forms of longform alt-journalism

That latter phrase is referring primarily to Substack and by extension to places like Beehiiv, if they're attracting any of the same people as a certain type of Substack.

First, I don't deny that fair chunks of the MSM is doing. Gannett's new deal with Reuters has the same Gannett lies as before about what the prospective savings will do. AP's lies earlier in 2024 about how little vs how much it still depends on US print journalism will come home to roost in 2025.

Among major individual papers, though I largely agree with with the non-endorsement angles of both of them, including the full background, the LA Times and Washington Post will both leak oil this year, and the Post is already shot itself in the foot again with how it's handling Ann Telnaes' resignation. It's leaking further oil since then; I'm no fan of Jennifer Rubin, but her leaving is another black eye.

Otherwise? Per The Hill claiming that Dustin Burrows' election as Texas Speaker of the House is a blow to the far right when it's really a blow to the far far right, is another reason the MSM, and its political analysis and news mags are failing. These people continue to willingly shift Overton Windows.

Then?

New Republic turning to semi-winger of old Mona Charen to discuss Bannon vs Musk? This is going to be a long four years if this is what the librul opinion mag version of the MSN thinks is hot stuff. 

But? Back to Substack.

The Substacks I'm thinking about are largely single-issue, including some, like Simplicius, who has made the "MSM is dying" claim. 

Update: Turns out he has a second Substack (and maybe more?). Off to blog.

Whichever of "two sides," or rejecting "two sides," one takes on Russia-Ukraine, as the war (not "special military option") enters its third year, especially if Trump doesn't end it anywhere close to his first day in office, appetite for reading about it, except among the most rabid Uki-tankies/NAFO Nazis on one side, and Putinistias/Russia-tankies on the other, will continue to ebb.

There's only so often you can write about one side or the other gaining or surrendering a whole 10 acres of generally meaningless ground on the steppes of eastern Europe before people who aren't into war porn or weapons geekery have their eyes glaze over.

For the rest of the steppe winter and early spring, there will be no land breakthroughs, no major new weaponry or anything else. 

And, assuming Trump, Putin and Zelensky come to no deal by April, there will be no big breakthroughs after that. Trump, his weathervaning and blather aside, will not make major cuts to current sanctions on Russia, though he won't add to them, either. China's Xi will do enough to continue to string Putin along, but major aid increases won't happen.

In fact, reports that Trump is behind the push for Ukraine to lower its draft age (a human capital version of "NATO members should pay more") is already throwing off the calculus of at least some Substackers, I'm sure. That said, Trump could still lessen the pipeline of US aid, and could still push for a deal with Putin. But, you know what? Trump has not said a thing about the Biden Adminstration's new sanctions on Russia's energy industry, including the so-called "ghost tankers." Now, Newsweek is trying to spin Trump's NSA designee Mike Waltz's push on the draft, saying that it could be setting a precondition for manpower to stabilize the lines. I don't buy it. See above; the lines are stable until at least April. Per "The Dissident" Substack, Trump gave private backing to GOP Congresscritters to vote FOR previous aid packages to Ukraine. And, we're again reminded that Trump 1.0 sold arms packages to Ukraine that Dear Leader Obama refused to do. Plus, Waltz has been a past supporter of the war. (As of a week ago, Simplicius was still saying "we'll wait and see" if this is Trump's policy or not; The Dissident's piece was from last year.)

Lather.Rinse.Repeat.

I pick that as a primary example, but other types of single-focus journalism will likely also struggle, if their single-focus isn't that big of an issue in terms of reader interest, and there's just not a lot new happening.

Update, Jan. 18: The cluelessness of some comments there?

==

That said, traditional MSM fellow-traveler opinion or analysis sites like Wonkette, having traveled to Substack, let alone the still-odious Never Trumper Jennifer Rubin leaving the post to pair with Norm Eisen, need to die as well, and probably will shrink, if not die.

Texas Progressives "await" the start of the Lege

The Texas Speaker of the House battle hit a new high, or low, last week, when GOP Housecritter Cody Harris (presumably backing Dustin Burrows) filed a legal complaint against Texas GOP Chair Abraham George alleging intimidation and other issues over the threat to censure, complete with two-year primary ban, dissidents. Lone Star Left adds what the Trib missed — and maybe that Cody overlooked, too? Part of his complaint involves matters of criminality, not just civil law.

UPDATE: It's Burrows, 85-55 in the second round. The Trib reports nine "present" after Ana Maria Ramos fell out after the first round. That's still one short of 150; not sure if anybody was legally absent or what. BUT, contra the Trib, the stormtrooper followers of Christofascist Tim Dunn are NOT "insurgents." Shock me that Justin Barragán and Jasper Scherer have the bylines; they probably wrote the fucking header, too.

==

Shades of "Cadillac Desert" stupidity! Strangeabbott wants to take water from Houston and sell it to West Texas. Other than the water stupidity itself, one wonders if, in today's Tex-ass, this isn't a backdoor political punishment for Helltown. 

How well will New York State's shield law protect the mifepristrone-prescribing doctor being sued by Kenny Boy Paxton? It may hang on the difference between a lawsuit by a private actor and one by a state government, an issue rarely explored by federal courts.

To me, it's no surprise that UT-Austin's presidency remains vacant. DEI-busting, or busting anything that looks close to that, by the state, and more. At the same time, people like UT's outgoing Jay Hartzell have done little at public universities to protect pro-Palestinian students, so good fucking riddance — and I wish the best to pro-Palestinian protestors at SMU, where Hartzell is headed.

Disgusting — Texas has the fifth-highest rate of abandoned calls on any state's national suicide hotline. Why? In fair part due to a federal funding deficit that is set to grow, in part due to the state not picking up the gap. Not having more counselors manning more phone lines also wears out the ones who are already there.

Strangeabbott, Kenny Boy, et al, paid out $1M in private legal contracts to defend the state vs the feds on the floating buoys and razor wire in the Rio Grande. 

SocraticGadfly critically reviewed Jimmy Carter's presidential years and also discussed 1976 Democratic options.

In an overlooked part of the story that Fuckbook is getting rid of fact-checking, Hucksterman said that Fuckbook's safety and content team is being moved from California to Tex-ass because California might be biased. And Tex-ass isn't?

Look out for the New World screwworm in south Texas.

The Monthly thinks an "Ode to High Beams" is worth paywalling. It also thinks mini-profiling 10 rando librulz who left Tex-ass, even though four left back in 2022 and one in 2021, is worth something. It's "worth something" to the Monthly to presumably goose circulation for its paywall outside of Tex-ass borders, by 10 randos gushing to their friends that they were in the Monthly.

What's up with Matt Mullenweg putting his thumb on the scale at WordPress?

Off the Kuff analyzed the precinct data for the Railroad Commissioner's race in Harris County. (A piece that only a Kuffner could love; I got the Speaker's challenge links off Kuff and he could have submittted that.)

The Texas Signal has a timeline of Texas Republicans and January 6. 

The Observer documents how Texas' ban on testing strips contributes to fentanyl-related deaths. 

 Jef Rouner says book reading challenges are doing it all wrong.

Politico's futurists? Half wrong, and the "right" aren't black swans

Politico invited 15 futurists to make 2025 predictions, and here's my take. Most are laughable, and most the non-laughable ones aren't black swans. Only one, near the end, fits the bill.

Largest cyberattack in history? Semi-no brainer that AI could be hacked and cracked in service of a cyberattack. And, possibly, the largest in history.

A new Iran nuclear weapons deal? No fucking way, not after Trump 1.0 assassinated Soleimani.

Secessionists on the march? No, Congress is not approving an Oregon-Idaho border shift. Neither is the Oregon Lege, and maybe not Idahell's, for all I know. And, no, some off-the-wall weathervane statement by Trump ain't changing that fact on the ground, and therefore, this event won't trigger something bigger.

A new pandemic, and spreading because of wingnut reactions to COVID public health? Possible in 2025. Probable? You can't give odds on something like that. But, that doesn't make it a "black swan."

Trump-Xi alliance emerging? Yeah, a degree of rapproachment might happen, but probably not enough to call it an "alliance."

A two-state solution? No fucking way. At a minimum, Bibi will have to be voted out of office PLUS a credible non-Zionist alternative emerge on the "left" in Israel. At a maximum, the Saudis and other Gulf states will have to threaten economic action which US oil doesn't leave them fully in a position to do today. There's a reason why I mock the likes of John McLaughlin as Nat-Sec Nutsacks™, and stuff like this is it.

Market crash triggers a global panic? How big a crash? We're due for a recession in the US as I type, plus, per the Trump-Xi story, at some point, some Chinese bubbles will burst. So, not a black swan.

Climate action becomes the new norm? For whom? Shock me that this was written by climate change Obamiac Katharine Hayhoe, who has a hopey-dopey book out, too, per this section. 

Unexpected geopolitical alliances and realignments? Bryndan D. Moore, tho not listed as one of the Nat-Sec Nutsacks™, comes off like one. No, Trump ain't getting some massive realignment in the Middle East and Moore doesn't mention one elsewhere. Bye.

South Korea's secret nuclear weapons program? THIS I might just buy, and for such a program to have remained secret for this long? Black swan indeed. Plausibility? S. Nathan Park is at the Quincy Institute and thus NOT one of the Nat-Sec Nutsacks™. I'd ponder this one.

An unvaccinated military? Not likely. Joint Chiefs on down would push back hard against Trump listening to Brainworm Bobby on this one.

The people of Belarus could see freedom? Highly unlikely that Aleksandr Lukashenko falls; almost certainly not happening unless Putin falls first, or Lukashenko pulls a Prigozhin and marches on Moscow. Evelyn Farkas IS a Nat-Sec Nutsacks™ and one having the female version of a wet dream, as of course, if this DID happen, NATO membership for Belarus would be mentioned next.

Loss of power? Yes, we have an aging infrastructure in Merikkka, but a Cuban or Puerto Rican event ain't happening here.

The temptation to reach for the nuclear toolbox? Interesting, Jeff Greenfield, but why focus on Russia?

Decisive breakthrough in quantum computing? Isn't this just as much just around the corner as peaceful nuclear fusion?

Sympathy for the devil of wildfires? That's versus Counterpunch's Joshua Frank

I don't live in LA, so contra Joshua Frank of Counterpunch, who I guess has moved there from Montana (why?), I won't be scarred by the Palisades Fire. In fact, given the people who live in Topanga Canyon, and their contributions to carbon emissions that fuel climate change? As long as no people are hurt, I say "burn baby burn." 

As for Frank's lament?

Beyond Mike Davis’s provocative title to his classic essay, “The Case for Letting Malibu Burn,” is the thesis that resources and attention are disproportionately allocated to save the rich and their property at the expense of the poor. While this is historically the case in Los Angeles, the raging fires here are far worse than even the great Mike Davis could have foreseen.

Schools are burning, libraries, restaurants, stores, churches, state parks, mobile homes, apartment complexes, horses, mountain lions. People will die. Lives are being destroyed.

Mountain lions almost certainly escaped. Ditto any blacktail deer, which Frank didn't mention. Let's not go all Bambi fire scene, Josh. 

==

Update: For shame on Frank for not linking Davis' piece. I didn't google earlier, but here it is. Already in 1995, Davis noted that Malibu was the wildfire capital of the US, and that some home sites had burnt twice in a generation. Contra Frank, the most recent fires are not an argument for setting aside Davis, but rather, for doubling down on his thesis. 

I almost wonder if Frank was making a rhetorical flourish while hoping nobody would follow up, let alone call him out. Indeed, Davis notes the problems in poorer parts of LA, like Westlake, are other fire issues, NOT "wildfires":

(T)he two species of conflagration are inverse images of each other. Defended in 1993 by the largest army of firefighters in American history, wealthy Malibu homeowners benefited as well from an extraordinary range of insurance, land use, and disaster relief subsidies. Yet, as most experts will readily concede, periodic firestorms of this magnitude are inevitable as long as residential development is tolerated in the fire ecology of the Santa Monicas.

On the other hand, most of the 119 fatalities from tenement fires in the Westlake and Downtown areas might have been prevented had slumlords been held to even minimal standards of building safety. If enormous resources have been allocated, quixotically, to fight irresistible forces of nature on the Malibu coast, then scandalously little attention has been paid to the man-made and remediable fire crisis of the inner city.

He's got your number, Frank.

Also, contra somebody else who was the author of another Counterpunch piece, Davis makes clear this landscape evolved to burn.

The only thing missing from Davis' excerpt is the addition of highly flammable eucalyptus trees to an already burn-needing landscape.

==

I was going to talk about the earliest reported deaths here, but I'm pulling that for a separate post. And that's now up, and I discuss that most the people who died, and certainly all the early deaths, had no reason to die. In fact, other than a truly "trapping" fire like Paradise in Northern California, people in general usually don't die in wildfire for any good reason.

Mobile homes? Maybe at the other two fires? But, show me a picture of a mobile home in Malibu in general or Topanga Canyon in particular. (The demographics for the ZIP code that include the area are $118K household income with average home value of $928K. Neighboring ZIPS run $91-$158K. So, no, not Rodeo Drive, but even by SoCal standards, a cut above average.) Churches? What? Nobody prayed away the fire? Yes, we're in snark territory. Oh, if there's churches paying taxes, might be more money to fight these wildfires. State parks? Goddamit, Josh, you've seen Yellowstone in the first years and decades after 1988. These places needed to burn.

As for people a cut below rich celebs and such? You chose to move there — to a place that's sensitive to mudslides as well as wildfires, and to a place with only one exit.

I've hiked in parts of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, and what I believe is county parkland where MASH and other TV shows were shot. Eaton Canyon, where one of the other fires is, looks like a nice area. Sure would be nice to have the money to live there. It would be nicer yet to respect the urban-wildland interface. It's happening up in your native Montana, too, Joshua, in places like Gallatin County.

Anyway, whether it's you there yourself, you staying with a friend, or just a general plaint? I guess your fire ox is being gored. But it sounds like you there in general in person, whether in Topanga Canyon or not.

As for the Palisades fire and homes? As of Thursday night, burned homes included those of Paris Hilton and Billy Crystal. I'm crushed. I'm more than crushed that Mandy Moore (whoever the fuck she is), worth $14 million, started a GoFundMe for burned-out in-laws, then bitched when called out. Even if it's not as bad as it looks? You lie down with fleas, Josh ...

And, with the Sunset Fire breaking out in Hollywood Hills Thursday night, I saw "private firefighters" mentioned on Shitter. But, I'm sure ox-goring is OK with that, too, though not too much capitalism-goring. That said, as I said there and elsewhere, where's the prison firefighters, including the female prison firefighters that Kamala is a Cop couldn't get enough of as Cal AG? As I then joked, Gov. Nuisance needs to get more private prisons in California, to help out both the rich and the neoliberals with private (prison) firefighters. More here on "convict leasing" of inmates as firefighters and the practice in general, still legal at the state level in 43 states.

If you meant to write primarily about the other fires, where there probably are a few people with mobile homes (the main ZIP for Altadena is at $88K household income and house value of $550K, and Sylmar area is about the same), you should have started there. But, even then? City-Data says poverty levels are low in Altadena, tho about California state average in the unincorporated Sylmar; incorporated San Fernando is a bit below average.

As for the non-rich? We should do the same thing that Dear Leader should have done after the Great Recession with people in places like Phoenix and Las Vegas, instead of his HAMP and HARP and other alphabet soup on homes and mortgages. Flat buy out the mortgages — but ONLY give relief to lenders if they don't replace the old houses with new ones — while paying the homeowners to move to Cleveland, St. Louis and Des Moines, where the water is.

As for climate change? If only Frank, like the Green Party of Los Angeles County, had mentioned the Polluters Pay Climate Cost Recovery Act, his screed would have been more acceptable right there.

The Polluters Pay Climate Cost Recovery Act (SB 1247), sponsored in 2024 by State Senator Caroline Menjivar (D-San Fernando Valley) would establish a Polluters Pay Climate Cost Recovery Program administered by the California Environmental Protection Agency, that would require fossil fuel polluters to pay their fair share of the damage caused by the sale of their products, in order to relieve a portion of the burden from climate harms borne by California taxpayers.

That said, under Cal law, it would require a 2/3 vote because it would involve a tax increase. But, Frank at least could have mentioned it.

And, beyond that? Cal Dems have that two-thirds margin in both the state Assembly and state Senate.

==

Glad I waited until now to write. Frank, who clearly is somewhere in LA now, if not Pacific Palisades, pens a part two, in part pushing back against schadenfreude of some. My writings above don't have schadenfreude, IMO, but they do call out Frank's various wrongnesses. Nor do I promote "collective guilt" about this.

One new wrongness is noting the weather that produced this is unprecedented in modern times. Yeah? Depending on how you define "modern," the drought across the Southwest is unprecedented in modern times, but did happen to the Anasazi 800 years ago. Anthropogenic climate change is also unprecedented in modern times. You admit the "fossil fuel cartel" has responsibility for that. To flip your airing of grievances on its head, Josh, did eXXXon, as I spell it, force you to move?

I also "like" that Frank said:

The historic Black community of Altadena has been decimated.

You live there yourself, Joshua? First piece looked focused awfully much on the Palisades, as I said.

One final note is that Frank has apparently abandoned Shitter, too.

==

As for "should have known about this," if, like Frank, you're a recent move to the Southland in general, and specifically, to one of its more vulnerable areas? Capital and Main nails it:

In Pasadena, a California city on the edge of a major fire burning through Eaton Canyon, where researchers have collected data on precipitation since 1893, they recorded that half of its 20 rainiest days ever occurred since 2000. That includes one day last February when nearly 5 inches of rain fell.

Yet not a single drop has fallen in Pasadena and much of Los Angeles County since early May, according to data from the National Centers for Environmental Information. All the vegetation that grew during the rains in the first half of the year dried out when the rains stopped, transforming Southern California into a vast landscape of tinder that exploded this week.

The intensity of extreme precipitation will continue rising through the century, according to Cal-Adapt, a data analysis initiative sponsored by the California Energy Commission. The state also forecast longer periods of drought exacerbated by rising heat, according to its Fourth Climate Assessment summary report, released in 2018 and currently being updated. These two factors will likely increase the wet-dry cycle, fueling more intense and erratic wildfires, say climate experts. In 2021, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration concluded that drier air due to climate change was the “dominant” cause of variations in wildfire behavior in the West.

This is even more true at a place like Counterpunch, where you're supposed to be leftists of some sort on climate change, or rather the climate crisis. And, even if Frank moved there before 2019 (see below) he surely moved long after 2000. It's called "Cadillac Desert."

So, to further turn Frank on his head? I can feel sympathy for Altadena, but none for the rich people whose carbon emissions made their own small contributions to the Palisades fire, and also feel none to people like Frank who are relatively recent moves there.

Also, and if I'm sticking the shiv in, I'm sticking it in all the way, if Joshua Frank can afford to live in, or near, Topanga Canyon, then Counterpunch sure as hell doesn't need donations from me.

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Counterpunch's head honcho, Jeff St. Clair (I guess the publisher's position remains permanently vacant in memoriam Alexander Cockburn) triangulates off Frank in last Friday's Roaming Charges. After noting that even in a place like the Palisades, poorer minorities get hit harder than rich whites, he does note LA had a couple of days of prep for the current round of Santa Ana winds. And, there's the past:

In 2019, Eric Garcetti, then the mayor of Los Angeles, told David Wallace-Wells: “There’s no number of helicopters or trucks that we can buy, no number of firefighters that we can have, no amount of brush that we can clear that will stop this. The only thing that will stop this is when the Earth, probably long after we’re gone, relaxes into a more predictable weather state.”

Joshua, did you move there after 2019? Actually, he appears to have moved there earlier, as his Wiki page shows he was writing for the OC Weekly (along with "Ask a Mexican" Gustavo Arellano) in 2016. But, nothing has prevented him from moving back out, oh, since the Paradise Fire. Or the Dixie Fire.

St. Clair's piece also includes a video clip of mountain lions fleeing one of the fires, presumably successfully. What about white-tailed antelope squirrels or other critters that aren't charismatic megafauna?

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Related to all of this? Readers will note the "new blogroll coming soon" that I've started populating. The XML hacks I used on the old one to get it to show all, rather than the latest 10, pieces, won't let me add new or delete old. And, I'd like to add a couple of common Substacks. And, I also am planning on getting rid of some shit, and Counterpunch was already on my possible hit list before this.

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Update: At Pro Publica, Tim Golden, who grew up in the Palisades a full generation, it seems, before Frank moved there or anywhere near there, says the neighborhood was already becoming "rico" 40 years ago or something close to that.

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Update: Climate Change Josh has 35 percent more reasons to move, per Yale Climate Connections. Er, 35 percent and increasing.