The Power of Stupid

by Henry Schulte

The power of stupid. Source: Getty Images

It’s easy to pick on California. It does more stupid things than the rest of the states combined. Though liberal Oregon and Washington don’t do a bad job at being dumb, and Maine is closing in fast.

For years, California latched on to the climate steering wheel with a white-knuckle steadfastness. Former governor Jerry Brown predicted we’d all be burned up by now and Gavin Newsom continues to pander to the easily swayed and the old hippies preaching that California must be the leader of the climate hoax. He decrees no gas stoves, all electric cars you can’t charge, and to become dependent on Venezuela for our petrol so we can boast how clean we are.

Which countries have the worst pollution and the most people? The answer is easy. China and India have 2.8 billion people combined, almost 25% of the entire world population. The United States runs a very distant 3^rd with 334 million. And those tremendously populated countries are also supreme leaders in polluting the entire planet because dirty air isn’t bound by borders. The other thing China and India share is poverty. America is now racing to catch up adding ten million more humans in the last 36 months, and all those new inhabitants are poor.

Now to my point. The stupid in Sacramento are forcing… well no, blackmailing communities to get them to build thousands of houses… or else.

For example, if Beverley Hills doesn’t buckle up, then the existing homeowners, who have been paying a crap load in property taxes for years will be punished. The city will be forced to deny any new building permits, even for interior remodels such as kitchens and bathrooms.

At the whim of liberal politicians to fix a problem they created; they’re going to punish the very people who fund their stupidity. There’s common sense for you. You might say, well they’re rich people, they can deal with it. But every municipality in the state is required to flood its neighborhoods with more housing, as we see in Santa Barbara County.

Government Gobblygook

It’s the hypocrisy of it all that bothers me. Sacramento screams we need more low-cost housing while at the same time punishing everyone with outrageous rules and regulations to reduce our “carbon” footprint. How can you justify millions of new homes filled with millions of new drivers and using tons more natural gas and increased electricity use?

None of the liberal Democrats and their followers think anything through. We are officially a sanctuary state and therefore we welcome millions of new people who don’t even know what all the talk about climate change is about. Nor do they care. Most Americans don’t care. People who think for themselves are no longer fooled by the lying nonsense anymore. In polls, climate concerns run last in importance. Uncontrolled Immigration and the high cost of food and fuel are what’s important.

In trying to better understand, I attempted to read SB County’s Housing Plan regarding the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) map. The proposal is for over 5,000 homes. From what I can see, nothing is planned for Montecito. No surprise, but loads of housing for SB, especially talk of the big plan for La Cumbre Plaza. And of course, 75% of the housing will be concentrated in Goleta, Santa Barbara’s dumping ground. It was an unusual vote where liberal Joan Hartman, Steve Lavagnino and liberal Das Williams voted in favor and liberal Lois Capps and Bob Nelson voted no.

Fill it in; Built it up; Pack them in

But why stop in Goleta, why not destroy the rural and open lands of Buellton and Solvang as well? Pack ‘em in where people live because it’s rural and not overcrowded. To Sacramento we’re just patches of empty dirt that need to be built over to accommodate their decree; your pastoral lifestyle be damned.

Historically, this county has been impossible to deal with acquiring permits for anything. If you have an indentation on your land that puddles water after a rain, it’s designated as federally protected wetlands. A winery can’t hold events unless it wants to enter the quagmire of getting a Conditional Use Permit (CUP). And there’s no guarantee you’ll ever get it. If you want a garden shed over 10 x10, the permit and hassle probably cost more than the shed. But suddenly it’s a piece of cake to rezone anything to accomplish the very thing this county has hated forever: development.

I’m not entirely opposed to progress. I’ve had my share of battles with the county over land use. And maybe there’s nothing else that can be done, but the 642 units proposed for La Cumbre Plaza doesn’t feel right. For those of you who remember when La Cumbre Plaza was first built, it was the place to go, especially at Christmas. You couldn’t find a parking spot and traffic could be horrendous. With likely two cars per unit meaning 1,200 cars going in and out every day into the State Street flow, I’m just guessing the Chick-fil-A problem will be chicken feed in comparison.

California Takes the Lead… to Squalor

Here’s how California plays with the language as their way of saying – lying – that building hundreds of thousands of new homes is good for the environment and the climate:

Changing land use patterns to meet housing, economic and climate goals is at the center of RHNA. All these changes to land use patterns through RHNA planning process reduce vehicle miles traveled. Potential for improved RHNA and RTP/SCS alignment.

That word salad makes as much sense as anytime VP Harris opens her mouth.

It means nothing.

After spending billions of dollars and decades later the state still can’t even lay down a piece of train track. But they think they can control the driving habits of Californians?

The Regional Housing Needs Allocation (fluffy meaningless name) as far as I can see, after the state spent over $17 billion from 2018 to 2022 on the homeless, isn’t planning housing for the 170,000 who they still haven’t been able to figure out how to put a roof over their heads.

In summary: California wants to be the leader is reducing our carbon footprint by adding millions more carbon boots on the ground; building more houses but not improving our infrastructure; releasing more carbon in the air by increasing traffic on our roads; stop using natural gas and go all-electric, which requires coal to produce the power.

Good plan.