THIS ONE IS DEFINITELY TRUMPS FAULT, RIGHT NANCY? ADD THE ARTICLE!
It is often hard for me to reach back in my memory to the late 50’s and early 60’s. I do remember the trips to San Francisco during the span of about 12 years. My first clear memory was tagging along with my father and crusty old granddad Joey to Kezar Stadium to watch a 49er game in 1959.
Oh, how the sights and sounds of that day were embedded into that 7-year old’s brain. I had no idea who Tommy was, but my grandfather, chewing on that old cigar was yelling, “kick the damn ball Tommy”. There was something about a guy named “Red”, that he should be buried out under some cement somewhere.
In my play back home in Oroville CA, I combined what I had heard and pretended I was the great “Tommy Red”. It was the creation of a child, the imaginative fusion of what I know now to be that of a great kicker and a head coach. There were other words my father looked uneasy about that day and when I started emulating the old man back home, I was scolded quite harshly.
There was the return to California St where my mother and Grandmother Blanche had spent the day, uncomfortably I imagine for my mom. The cable cars, the honking of horns, the door man at the tall magnificent building that housed the luxury apartment, those big brass, thick glass doors that swung with a clicking noise.
This was my father’s turf, a bouncer out of the 30’s at some famous bars, keeping an eye on my uncle Dick who played in a popular band out of Chicago. Dick Crosby had a shot or two at the Bal Tabarin in the late 30’s. And there, my mother, a country girl far removed from the open spaces she required for being at ease. And me, well, I guess I was in heaven. To top it off, I got a whole dollar bill from the cranky old guy, while he instructed grandmother the beer in the fridge could not get any colder. If I was in heaven, he was God, and that’s where I would leave my heart.
I’ve returned to The City by the Bay more than a few times in the last 50 years; but am partial to the outskirts, the ocean, the park, maybe to the zoo. I’ve retrieved my heart and took it back. California St is lost to me now.
The proximity to the Richmond District where residents used to walk, free of many of the urban concerns, now, increasingly are facing an ever-growing homeless population. But the true crisis in the city is far removed from my father’s old stomping grounds.
A point-in-time count done in July of this year shows the number of homeless in the city proper is about 10,000, an increase of 30% in two years, as reported by Benjamin Oreskes in a piece from the LA Times, June 9th, 2019. Considering that the surrounding counties are seeing the same or larger increases, as many have begun to realize, all California large population centers are at a tipping point, an acute and worsening problem that has become politically charged and polarizing.
There is a fellow, who when young, lived for a while atop Stanyan Street. That’s not far from and just south of California St, near “The Haight”, as we called it in the 60’s, at least those of us who did not have the “privilege” to hang out there. That young fellow would be none other than the former mayor and current governor of the state of California, Gavin Newsome. Now there are no homeless around Stanyan Street. They are close, but if one without a home happens up that hill, they will be ushered away in short order. The property had been owned by the family for several generations. Its value is about 4 million.
You’ve heard that the President of the United States has often been accused of, well, can I use the word exaggerating? You know, those huge “impactful” lies as in a recent one; Thousands of birds are killed and lay dead under windmills “each day”. That’s not true of course, the “per day” part, but the negative impact windmills have on increasing the Condor population and birds of prey in general leaves much to ponder about the necessity of windmills as an alternative power source.
It also lends insight as to the impact of the “exaggeration”. I’ll leave that for now and get back to the point I wanted to make. Just the other day, The President seeking shield from this impeachment farce, took aim at Mr. Newsome, categorizing the California homeless problem as dire. I’m going to suggest this was NOT a case of a famous “exaggeration”.
Newsom was mayor of San Francisco from January 2004 through January 2011. I pulled up an interview on “Axios on HBO” he did and found where he made the claim, “The vast majority” of San Francisco’s homeless people “also come in from — and we know this — from Texas. Just (an) interesting fact.” He had been challenged as to why San Francisco’s homeless population did not experience a net decline during his tenure as mayor. Remember the point-in time count I referred to earlier. Yes, that’s the one where in, the question is ask; (in my terminology) “From whence doth thou cometh”? The answer consistently showed a large majority of people had lived in San Francisco prior to becoming homeless. A smaller share said they lived in another California county. The smallest percentage said they lived out of state before becoming homeless in San Francisco. Are we all prone to a bit of “exaggeration”? Maybe. Might some be more meaningfully impactful in the negative?
The governor found himself the other night watching the sixth Democratic Presidential debate from the audience at Loyola Marymount University. The private Jesuit school is situated on the west side of Los Angeles and is scenically positioned atop the bluffs overlooking Playa Vista. There is no trace of homeless folks around there, but we have all been privy to the news that The City of Angels has an out of control problem of dreadful circumstances. I suppose the setting was inspirational enough for a reporter to ask of the governor, concerning the topic and opinions uttered in the debate, why it was President Trump’s responsibility to take care of the housing crisis that California has itself created. I will leave it to you to search out his lengthy response and answers to the follow ups.
But allow me to add. I’ve lived in California all my life. I’m tempted to help make part of it the State of Jefferson. That dream, all be it highly unlikely, is completely based on the liberal, radical, dictatorial way the state is run by the likes of the governor and his colleagues in the State House.
The governor and his cronies take zip, naughta, zilch, responsibility for the slop considered freebies given, then left to rot or defecated out in disease ridden piles that rats scurry through and footsteps tread. Oh yes, sure, they call on others to take action. Democrats have been at the helm in California as the homeless problem has spiraled completely out of control. But somehow, it’s the Republican Party and Trump’s fault.
The rich liberal elite and their political hacks are mostly officious, pontificating mongrels, gorged by monstrous contributions by the likes of George Soros. They look down on us deplorables who find ourselves in the midst of a crisis. That crisis wouldn’t have anything to do with climate change, would it? Well no, unless the homeless require warmth…….na! Somehow liberals will twist that as a negative. Wouldn’t be the need for more safe spaces and crying rooms for university Trump deranged “sculls full of mush” (as one famous commentator has coined), would it? I’d continue with where this list is trending if the space allowed. Perhaps another time.
Voting out the scoundrels, those finger pointers, worshipers of big government solutions, would solve the problem almost instantaneously. We would watch as the barriers placed on us by the dark priests lodged in their basilicas of big government would crumble. Before voting, there are those amongst us currently initiating recalls. One important one is the recall of the mayor of LA, Eric Garcetti. Where are the results of the allocated $1.2 billion to build 10,000 housing units for the homeless Mr. Garcetti? Can Newsome be next, please? And Mr. Trump, exaggerate away sir, seems to be helping.
The solution? Community teamwork! Innovative ideas that often require the putting aside of over burdensome codes and regulations. Release of open space in township, city, and government owned property allowing philanthropic entrepreneurship to be applied. Thousands of small huts at minimal cost or like these innovative ways found at this website
You and I, each of us, MUST help. Churches and nonprofit and yes, as hard as it is for me to say, government, but from leadership that is spontaneous and creative without the red tape and bureaucratic mess that is tied to its purse strings. Shall we start?
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