Authoritarianism in Los Angeles
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This week the Mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti, has gone one step further in flexing his power. He has essentially expanded on an order he made earlier this year in reaction to the COVID19 pandemic. The order this week has shifted though from businesses to households. If a homeowner is violating some arbitrary and vague rules about having gatherings of a “large” size, the city will cut water and power to that household. There is no number given as to what a “large” gathering is, there is a threat though to cut off a household thus endangering those that live at the house. In short, if you don’t follow these authoritarian rules set in place by the government, the city will endanger your life for you.
Garcetti is a tyrant plain and simple. Under no authority in any constitution, he has deemed it within his power to cut water and power off to residents. This kind of authoritarianism should not be tolerated and there are simple ways to avoid it. The measures to avoid it though were passed up and even voted away by Californians for decades. One way to ensure this doesn’t happen is by making sure that your power and water aren’t supplied by a government-protected monopoly. We have no issue with monopolies in general as long as they are not protected by the government. Famed, and Nobel Prize-winning economist, Friedrich Hayek, laid it out best when he said that the only place there should never be a monopoly is with utilities. Here we are though where the only monopolies are not only in utilities but are also government protected. These firms have so much protection that they can get away with the deaths of dozens of people and hardly be held accountable at all. If that were a private firm that killed dozens the firm would be torn apart in court. With such power and no recourse, what can the people of L.A. do? If their water and power are shut off they aren’t able to go to another provider, there are no options in the market and this is what has been tolerated for far too long. The people of L.A. are now seeing how such concentrated power can be harmful. Sadly though we don’t expect them to change their attitude towards the monopoly issue.
The other measure of recourse that the people of Los Angeles should be able to take would be one of revolt, but the people of L.A. and California, for decades, have voted for politicians to take away their right to bear arms and defend themselves from tyranny. For years when they were warned that the right to bear arms and protect yourself was designed to keep the government in check they would retort with something along the lines of, “of that will never happen here.” Well, it is happening now and they have no way to fight back right now. Their only possible recourse, if allowed, might be to recall the mayor and vote him out. A long-drawn-out process that can take years when people could be cut off from utilities very soon. Angelenos and Californians have dug their grave and now they are laying in it. This isn’t a “we told ya so moment” but rather a warning of how evil those in power are.
I ask too, where is the outrage from the woke left on this? For years they have said how water, power, and so many other things are human rights. Now when a mayor threatens to cut people off from this they are silent. They again have proven themselves to have no principles and no backbone.
This is something we need to take note of. What we are seeing take place in L.A. is troubling and can happen in any other city. Capitulation to the government in L.A. seems like the only course due to the damage they have done to themselves for decades, this can’t happen anywhere else.
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Keep that coffee warm for us
LWS
