A 2024 state audit revealed that California spent $24 billion on homelessness programs between 2018 and 2023 but did not consistently track whether this spending reduced homelessness. The money is not physically “missing”; rather, the state failed to collect sufficient data to evaluate the effectiveness of the funds.
If you are implying that Gavin Newsom misappropriated these funds, you are a liar, and a revolting human being.
If you infer from this that Newsom is a criminal, you’re a moron, and you’re a huge part of what makes this country so totally dysfunctional.
If you’re trying to quantify how completely f***ed up the United States is at this point, I refer you to the meme here.
Was it the left that stormed the Capitol, launched a pointless and illegal war in Iran, worked to stifle voting, indicted political opponents, gave tax breaks to billionaires, cut important government programs, threatened to annex Canada and Greenland, gave Trump, his family, and his businesses immunity from all audits and investigations for any past tax-related misconduct, and made our transportation system and electric grid dirtier?
We’ve all heard ideas like the one being expressed here, though this one sounds extreme. Jail sentence? Education is exclusively an exercise in pounding in bad habits?
What’s the outcome for students in the very worst of our schools that make no attempt whatsoever to help its pupils learn to think critically? Well, their kids learn to:
Read and write
Do math, at least through algebra
Understand some level of history and geography
Make friends and get along with others
Establish independence from the parents
Gain the qualifications for employment
What’s the alternative? Illiteracy? Social isolation? Child labor? Poverty? Neurotic sloth? Being a burden on society?
Is it a coincidence that the countries with the best educated children are the happiest, sanest and most productive nations on the planet?
I’ve often wondered why people like this German woman, an ultra-right-wing politician with no more training in this subject than my gardener, is taken more seriously than the many thousands of scientists who have been studying climate physics for all their adult lives.
And Germany? Anti-science?
Yes, this sect is minor, but how does it exist at all?
It’s understandable that Americans are seeing their culture descend into the pits of the cutthroat, the bastard, since that’s the character of the man whom we elected (twice) to lead our country.
I caught a glimpse of this as a soccer coach about 25 years ago, when my son Jake was a considerable powerhouse when he was little. In the first game of his under-8 season, he scored all three goals in a 3-2 win over an opponent whose dominant player — Paul, as I remember — had scored both their goals. When we walked off the field, I asked Jake if he wanted to say something to Paul. As a coach and as a father, I was lucky enough to hear the brief but poignant conversation. Jake told they boy, who was clearly taking the loss rather hard, “Hey. You’re a good player.” Paul smiled, bowed his head, and replied softly, “Thanks. But you’re better than I am.”
Maybe we’re not doomed to become heartless assholes. Maybe the core humanity with which we are all born will somehow rise to the surface and move us forward.