Convict, Hotshot, or Municipal Firefighters: Which Side Are You On?
It is understandable and reasonable that many of you feel slighted by the overwhelming attention that convict crews are getting. As many of you have mentioned, it isn’t uncommon for news media to focus almost exclusively on these populations and it can feel like they are doing so intentionally despite the clear needs of non-convict crews – and I assure you, we hear you on the Left as much as we hear the convict crew even if you don’t have the informational streams to hear us talking back. But I implore you, please, look at this structure for what it is: worker manipulation and disempowerment.
The Looting of Los Angeles
There is a truth here that many are desperate to ignore: this is a class war. The rich who were able to mobilize private armies of fire fighters to protect their homes and businesses while everything their neighbors owned burned around them are turning around to point at Black and Brown young men minding their own business or seeking to save their own lives and loved ones. The politicians who were happy to allow private interests to subsume public resources as their own, who refused to stop the theft of our water, land, and opportunities in favor of those like the Wonderful Company (hope your pistachios taste like burning rubber) who have stolen some 90% of Californians’ water through underhanded manipulation of municipal levers and officials.