Morning Note

If your city was engulfed with flames, would you rather have water or a transgender cafe? 

Unfortunately, Los Angeles residents only seem to possess the latter. A deep dive into LA County’s budget reveals that Mayor Karen Bass allocated tens of thousands of FY 2024-25 dollars to a “Midnight Stroll Transgender Cafe,” a “Gay Men’s Chorus,” and other homosexual pride programs while cutting nearly $18 million from the fire department and failing to ensure the city’s hydrants were properly functioning. 

The budget also granted $170,000 for “Social Justice Art-Worker Investments,” $13,000 for “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Heritage Month Programs,” and nearly $10,000 for the “One Institute the International Gay and Lesbian Archives.”

The beginning of the California fires was out of any political actor’s control, but the state’s ineffective response is the result of unserious people occupying consequential public offices. If “wokeness” is a leader’s top priority, they will be highly unlikely to respond well to a real-world crisis. Californians are learning that the hard way.

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