Re: Bad reporting Hazards to Homeless article

On Sat, 13 Apr 2024 12:19:04 -0700
BTR1701 <atropos@mac.com> wrote:

In article <uve3ca$31lpn$1@dont-email.me>,
 "Adam H. Kerman" <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:
 

Uptown viaduct fire reminder of hazards to homeless: 'There really
is no peace'
By Caroline Kubzansky and Rebecca Johnson
Chicago Tribune
April 13, 2024 at 5:00 a.m.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2024/04/13/uptown-viaduct-fire-reminder-of-haza
rds-to-homeless-there-really-is-no-peace/
 
Despite the headline, we learn IN THE THIRD PARAGRAPH that the
hazard in question to other homeless people was from a homeless
woman who, with either reckless disregard or murderous intent, set
her own tent on fire, which led to all the other tents catching
fire fire. Note that one of the homeless men interviewed stated
that the area under the viaduct is usually fried, so there are
fires set repeatedly. 

 
The 'progressive' media and politicians never give these people any
agency. All of the ills they both experience and commit-- from drug
addiction, to crime, to sexual assault-- it's all visited on them
from some outside force beyond their control. They are *never* held
accountable for their own choices or their own lives. They're treated
as if they're helpless infants.
 

If the homeless were allowed agency, there would inevitably be pressure
to hold them accountable for their actions. That would undermine the
"progressive" Saviours who are going to fix everything with vast new
and expensive - and almost certainly futile - programs to help the poor
darlings. It's far better to just declare them all to be helpless
captives of their addictions and mental health so that "help" can be
applied in whatever fashion the government and their agents in the civil
service deem necessary. Many many billions of tax dollars can then be
wasted on schemes that won't solve the problem but WILL enrich
the agencies that run the schemes.

That headline was misleading, and I'd say who set the fire should
have been stated in the first paragraph. 

 
A misleading headline, a misleading article, in the legacy media?
Surely you jest!
 

In paragraph six, the murder of a well-known homeless man (who
walked without disturbing others rather than just sitting in a
doorway) was conflated. But the crime against him was attempted
murder by someone who was not homeless; he was set on fire while
sleeping. It became a murder as he later died of injuries sustained.
 
This was just bad reporting entirely. The danger from homeless
encampments under viaducts is that one or more individuals will set
fires, and fires spread. Gee. Fires can even destroy viaducts. Maybe
allowing "permanent" encampments once people start fires is
horrifically bad public policy. 

 
You should have seen the tortured leaps of illogic and linguistic
legerdemain that Newsom and Karen Bass went through to avoid
admitting the fact that it was a vagrant encampment that they let
flourish that was responsible for burning down the 10 freeway back
before Christmas.
 
Nevertheless, the vagrants *were* responsible for the fire. So now we
have vagrants cutting one of the most traveled freeways in the
nation. When it was down, there was talking of merchandise shortages
all the way on the East Coast because of the blockage.

"When it was down...." Am I correct in inferring from your verb tense
that 10 has been repaired and is now flowing normally? How did they
accomplish that so quickly? Infrastructure projects typically take ages
to plan and execute.

Please don't tell me that you brought in the Chinese to do some of
their notorious "tofu dreg" construction!

The White
House declared it a national emergency. This is what vagrants are now
doing and what has been the response? Nothing. Vagrants are still
being allowed to camp under freeways because literally noting they do
is bad enough to inconvenience them in any way.
 
Take down a freeway? Not bad enough.
 
Burn down a forest, destroy a couple hundred homes and kill a few
people? You go ahead and keep camping in the hills. It would be
insensitive of us to bother you.

Who is running for governor this time around? I assume Newsom will have
an opponent or two. Are any of them likely to be competitive? I keep
thinking there must be lots of people in California who are beyond sick
of Gov. Hairgel and would love to see a change.

--
Rhino