It’s become fashionable among certain conservatives, libertarians, and assorted free-market types to claim that Republicans are no better than Democrats. Both parties, according to the disenchanted, have lost their way. Both parties are controlled by establishment cronies, who support big government of one sort or another.
But conservatives who are disillusioned with Republicans need to remember just how much is at stake if Democrats take over. To indulge in understatement, California offers a cautionary tale.
Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely
Since at least 2006 — the year Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a moderate Republican, totally capitulated to the Democratic establishment — Democrats have exercised absolute power in California. Their ongoing agenda, much of which has already been implemented, offers insight into just how different Democrats are from Republicans — even those watered down Republicans who struggle to earn votes from true conservatives.
California’s Democrats, in pursuit of environmentalist perfection, have legislated artificial scarcity of everything necessary to civilized life: land, housing, electricity, gasoline, water, transportation, and quality education — you name it. California has the most expensive homes, the highest utility prices, the worst roads, and failing schools. Behind the high-minded environmentalist rhetoric stand oligarchs who profit from scarcity; established corporations, public utilities, large landowners, and “green” entrepreneurs.
All of this elitist support is self-serving. All of it is hypocritical. All of it is deeply cynical, and utterly indifferent to working Americans.
California’s Proposition 10 offers an excellent example of how Democrats think. This deeply flawed state ballot initiative addresses the high cost of housing in California by authorizing cities and counties to impose rent control on all rental units, right down to the second homes that middle-class Californians may own in order to earn supplemental income. The negative consequences of a measure like Prop. 10 are obvious not only to anyone with a basic understanding of economics but also to anyone with plain common sense.
Not one Republican supports California’s Prop. 10, but plenty of Democrats do, including the notorious U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters, U.S. Senate candidate Kevin de León, and Los Angeles mayor and future presidential contender Eric Garcetti. And behind these Democrats, also endorsing Prop. 10, are California’s all powerful public sector unions, including the California Teachers Association, the California Nurses Association, AFSCME California, and SEIU California. And, of course, the California Democratic Party.
Prop. 10 is an example of how Democrats are making California’s housing shortage worse instead of better, but it’s not the only one. Also appearing on California’s statewide ballot next month are Prop. 1, which would borrow $4 billion to build “affordable housing,” and, Prop. 2, which would use state tax revenues to build more government-run homeless shelters. It is possible, if not likely, that every one of these propositions will pass.
Scandalous Inefficiency, Unassailable “Compassion”
Democrat “solutions” to the housing crisis aren’t limited to the state ballot, however. In Venice Beach, California, along one of the most expensive, touristy stretches of coastline in the world, are now permanent homeless encampments. To address the challenge, Los Angeles city officials are proposing to build a homeless shelter on 3.2 acres of vacant city-owned property less than 500 feet from the beach. This property, nestled in the heart of Venice’s upscale residential and retail neighborhoods, if commercially developed, would be worth well over $200 million. Imagine what could be done with that much money.
That a solution so scandalously inefficient could even be considered by the Democrats running City Hall in Los Angeles offers additional insights into the Democrat mind. Solving the homeless crisis really isn’t their goal here. Rather the intent is to create additional government-owned properties, hire additional government bureaucrats, while pretending to solve a problem. Should the Venice Beach property be developed as currently proposed, well connected construction contractors will rake in government funds, so eventually a few hundred homeless people will find shelter. Meanwhile, tens of thousands will remain outdoors.
Democrats, and not Republicans, made California’s housing unaffordable by passing restrictive laws such as CEQA, AB 32, SB 375, and countless others at both the state and local level. At the same time, it is Democrats, and not Republicans, who are inviting in the world’s poor en masse to come and live there. An estimated 2.6 million illegal aliens currently live in California. But the rhetorically unassailable compassion exhibited by these Democrats does nothing to alleviate hardship in the nations where these refugees originate, because for every thousand who arrive, millions are left behind.
The result? While California’s Democrats, and not Republicans, engineer a shortage of housing supplies, their welcoming sanctuary policies engineer a burgeoning housing demand. This is the deeply flawed, misanthropic vision Democrats have for America. Democratic power is rooted in wishful thinking by the naïve, and by the savvy because of epic greed. Republicans, no matter how tepid their convictions may be, would never have done to California what these Democrats have done. And it’s not even close.
When conservatives and libertarians think about where to cast their vote, they should look west to California, and think very hard about whether or not they want to live in a nation ruled by Democrats.
This article originally appeared on the website American Greatness.
