If excuses were good for putting out fires, California’s Democrat chief executive Gavin Newsom could have his state fixed in a jiffy.
As California sailed into the weekend literally ablaze, Newsom thought there was no better time to sit for a half-hour podcast interview with a former Obama administration official. It was beautiful and truly everything we’ve grown to expect from a Democrat in a position of authority.
In 30 minutes, Newsom explained that every criticism leveled at him is “misinformation,” that he is just as much a victim as anyone who saw his home burn to ashes, and that he’s helping fix the problem even though it’s not his responsibility.
Asked by former Obama speechwriter Jon Favreau if there was anything his administration “could have done to be better prepared for a fire” that has so far killed at least two dozen people and incinerated over 40,000 acres, Newsom — I’m not kidding you — asked the public to give him a little more credit. “Well, you always have to have some humility and grace as it relates to that question,” he said, “and I’m very self-critical in that respect.”
He has humility and grace, plus he’s very self-critical, so have a heart, why don’t you?
When Favreau then suggested to Newsom that he’s “ultimately responsible as the … governor of the state” and that the newly announced investigation into a water shortage appeared to some as an effort to “pass the blame,” the Democrat governor assured the audience that no, no, no, that’s not it at all. He’s actually in the same boat as the people who want accountability for as many as seven separate wildfires so far, a number of which are still torching the state’s biggest city after a full week.
“So, I’m the governor of California. I want to know the answer,” he said. “I’ve got that question, I can’t tell you by how many people — ‘What happened?’ My own team saying, ‘What happened?’ And I want to get the answers.”
Now wait a minute! Who’s in charge here? The governor wants answers!
Then he went back to needing you to do a little more for him.
“You have to have a little bit of grace,” Newsom said before adding, “But no one has any patience anymore in this weaponized — back to the grievance of Trump.”
Ah, of course. The problem in California isn’t the criminal lack of government preparation for a routine problem the state has faced for millennia — otherwise known as “a government’s basic function” — nor is it the willful neglect of the incompetent Los Angeles Democrat mayor, who reduced her fire department’s budget while allowing its personnel to preoccupy itself with kinky race and gender expression. No, the problem is actually Donald Trump, a man who has been a private citizen with no authority whatsoever since January of 2021.
The climax of the interview came when Newsom said that, in any event, this isn’t really his problem, though he’s kind enough to help out where he can. After bragging that he got the federal government to declare the fires in his state a “major disaster” — meaning all of us are now going to foot the bill for Newsom’s feckless governance — he said his administration was doing “10 other things” to assist in the recovery, “even though this is not a state responsibility.”
This is what it is to elect a Democrat. To put one in charge is to watch everything go up in flames.