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February twenty five.
If anybody has any doubts whatsoever that Karen Bass is a political animal, I do not have any doubts but Karen Bass being a political animal.
She won the mayor oralty simply because she's a Democrat. What's that? No other reason?
Because when Caruso, Paul Caruso ran, they both were on the same page. The only difference is he has vast experience as a business person, is an administrator of the first order, and Karen Bass is simply political. How do I know, Well, let's look at what she just pulled off, firing Kristen Crowley has had the LA Fire Department. Now we start with Karen Bass promising she would not travel to Africa when she ran for office. I will not travel.
Where was she when the fires broke out? Strangely enough, in Africa?
Karen Bass says. The reason she didn't.
Know the fires were going to be this bad this devastating is because Crowley did not tell her. That's the reason, even though the National Weather Service had reported days earlier that this fire it's going to be a life threatening situation because of the potential of fires because the winds were so high. So I guess by implication, Karen Bass says, no one in the Mayor's department looks at the National Weather Service at all.
They ignore it.
And it's the fire chief that has to tell the
Mayor's office that there is a problem. So Karen Bass, who's already admitted it was a mistake to go to Africa, knows about the fire, or should have known, decides to stay in Africa until the next day after the fires break out, And she's blaming Crowley and why Crowley is being fired because of a lack of leadership, and it's in the best interests of the City of Los Angeles to can her And she cited report that's Bass that fire officials decided not to assign about a thousand available
firefighters and dozens of water carrying engines for emergency deployment in the Palisades. Okay, what the United Firefighters of LA have said, and that is the biggest union. She was dismissed without a full investigation, and they went on.
We still have.
Nearly one hundred broken down fire engines, trucks, ambulances in the maintenance yard because of civilian mechanic job cuts.
And who cut the budget.
Of the fire department Why, strangely enough, Karen Bass cut tens of millions of dollars. But it's Crowley's fault. I mean, what a cheap shot at just pushing the blame on someone else. Just suck it up and say, yeah, we're gonna investigate before I'm at a can Crowley. We're going to see what happens. Now, Crowley has the ability to appeal. She's got ten days to appeal her firing, and that can be overturned by two thirds of the city council. City council in la is one of the strongest city
councils of any major city in the United States. They wield enormous power and they can overturn the firing even though the mayor has the ability to fire department heads. And we'll see what happens. Lack of leadership. Really, I'll tell you where lack of leadership is going to hit. And I think that if Karen Bass loses the next election her second term, which I hope she does, because she's just throwing She's looking for a scapegoat and she found it with a fire chief. I think this is
going to hurt her big time as it should. Just suck it up, you know, just say hey, you know I blew it. You know I made a mistake. It's going to hurt her in the next election. But I think the defense is I'd like to meet anybody who has not made a mistake, have them come up here and argue they have led an exemplarily an exemplary.
Political or professional.
Wife, never made a mistake. I think that's a terrific defense. God forbid honesty. And the problem is what she's doing is so hamhanded, so ridiculously transparent. Somehow people are going to agree with her. Oh yes, we don't need an investigation. Karen Bass is absolutely right. She has nothing to gain, She has no skin in the game, really, so I'm hoping,
hoping that Kristin Crowley does appeal. Here's the other problem though, and I would think, and I put myself in the shoes of Kristin Crowley, is even if I get the city council to reinstate me. I still have to have a relationship with Karen Bass, and can you imagine how poisoned that relationship is going to be, how tainted it's going to be.
You know what's a weird part of this bill is there's so much talk about out whistle blowers and protecting whistle blowers.
Couldn't the chief be seen as.
A whistle blower of sorts when she was saying, hey, we were let down and the city has been let down by.
She No, she's not a whistle blower. A whistle blower is usually anonymous. It talks about how horrible what's going on. I guess you could argue that, but it wouldn't be in this circumstances.
She just went public.
This is what she said in front of the news cameras and said.
Yeah, we failed the city, the city failed us. Oh does that mean Karen Bass failed the city?
Oh no, no, no, no, because Karen Bass had no idea Because even though she promised not to be in Africa, she was in Africa. By the way, it was for the inauguration of the Ganadian president, the GANAD. What's the plural Gannadian? Is it Canadians to be confused with Canadians.
I'm not sure anybody knows that.
I don't either, Yeah, Ganonese Canadians Canadians, not Guinea Guinesians or Ganesians.
Yeah, I know, I know. You stop correcting me. Okay, that's not your job, all right.
Coming up, as I have told you, Oh, I don't know, maybe two hundred times that whether Trump presidency, big changes are coming have already come, and I think the biggest one, certainly internationally, is Trump siding with Putin. Up to this point, the United States has been firmly on the side of Ukraine, even though there was some issues about supplying the latest weaponry out there.
The United States high high end weaponry.
But for the most part, the Biden administration was very pro Ukraine, as Europe has been. Now it's gone the other way. Putin is the good guy as far as Trump is concerned. The war in Ukraine was started by Ukraine. Putin is not a dictator. Zelensky is a dictator, and Putin and Trump are going to figure out the end of the war without Ukraine being involved in any of the discussion. Pete's talks, because what does Ukraine have to do with that. This is between Putin and the president.
So a little bit of history.
One of the things that the president, our president wants is basically out of NATO.
NATO was created in nineteen forty nine.
Because the fear of just the start of the Cold War big time, and the fear was a Russian invasion into Western Europe. There was a real fear of atomic weapons being used launched first by Russia, the space race, which Russia initially was winning, but the fear that Russia far outpaced the United States and technology, certainly missile technology.
In reality, Russia was.
Basically only concerned with the space race and did not have anywhere near the missile technology.
Kennedy was the ultimate Cold warrior, just for your information.
I mean, he came in and he stayed frightened, and he wanted to bulwark against Russia.
Okay, so that's the background of NATO. NATO was created to make sure Russia doesn't invade.
The United States was the primary source of not only men, but of money power, of money power and weaponry. Well, as the years go past, you know, not so much is Western Europe going to be invaded by Russia. Certainly Ukraine was, but Ukraine is an outlier and comparison is Hitler. Oh my, look what happened in Hitler in nineteen thirty eight with the annexation of Austria and then the attack of Poland.
It's not the same.
And the Western world at that time Europe just let it happen because they were frightened and they wanted peace. No matter what, It's a very different animal. Does anybody you know here?
It is? No one believed that what Hitler was going to do.
But is Russia going to attack any other country than Ukraine? Ukraine not being a member of NATO, NATO of which most of Western Europe, those countries are members of By treaty Article five of a NATO treaty, an attack on one is an attack on all, which means Europe is committed to going to war with Russia in the event of an attack on any of the NATO countries.
Putin knows that.
There is no sense that Europe would back down at all. Is Putin able to successfully fight Europeans? He can't even fight Ukraine. The number of men he has lost, the amount of equipment he has lost, The economy is a mess. All because of the war in Ukraine. Is he going
to expand that? I can't imagine it. Also, he has since he has become President of Russia and the dictator, and then even way way before when he was a colonel in the KGB, in the spy services, he has always maintained that Ukraine, at least the eastern part of Ukraine, is part of Russia. It is part of Russia. He doesn't think Germany is part of Russia. He doesn't think France is part of Russia. He doesn't think Spain is part of Russia.
So what does he do? He goes to war.
So here is President Trump saying we don't want any part of it.
Russia effectively has to grow up.
Russia relying on Europe has to grow up Europe relying on the United States. Well, those days are basically done. And our involvement in NATO is big time. A lot of troops, for example, in Germany. Why are there troops in Germany? Well to protect Western Europe from the Russian invasion, which.
At this point is kind of hard to believe. Maybe I'm wrong, I have no idea.
Maybe Putin is crazy enough to invade a NATO country and go to.
War with Europe, all of Europe don't know. My guess is no.
So Trump's position, and I think to a great extent, he's right, Hey, it's time for us to stop being the policeman of the world. Now for those of you, and he's talking to Europeans, do you want that kind of security?
You guys do it? Don't rely on us anymore.
And the reality is Europe has relied on the United States as a default. They'll take care of us, the US will take carebus. So I think that's a legitimate argument.
I do.
There are many people that think, in the amount of money we spend the defense of Europe, is it really are battle? I mean, it will be if it turns out that Russia invades any one of the NATO countries. And how you think Russia is going to do with the United States as well as all the other European countries.
The vast majority of Europe, you know, is proutent it and go to war.
You know, I doubt that. So Europe has to grow up. Now you couple that, which is a legitimate stand. Whether you believe it or not, you can't argue it's a legitimate stand, at least in my opinion with the statements that it's Zelenski who is the dictator Ukraine started the war.
Putin is the nice guy, He's the good guy. Do you remember during the first term where.
Donald Trump said, I believe Putin more than I believe seven All of the intelligence agencies in the United States, all seventeen of them are liars.
They are part of the deep state.
Putin is the one who's telling the truth and said he's a good guy. On top of that, you know who's jumping up and down for joy Putin. He's getting exactly what he wants. He's the big winner on this one. Now, Trump may be considered the big winner in certain circles, those who want the US out of Europe, but there is no question to the extent that Donald Trump wins this. Putin is on a whole different level in terms of the wind, in terms of the win. All right, another
chapter in the digital aid. On Sunday, our Governor Gavin Newsom announced an initiative, a new Digital Democracy initiative. And what it's going to do is connect residents, all residents in California who want to go online. It will connect those residents directly with government officials in times of disaster allow them to express their concerns. So how do normal people, those of us who are not in government. What is
the way that we connect with our government officials? We go to town halls, we write letters or now send emails. We accost them on the street. That's the fun part, bashing them on the street. We do it via the news organizations who shove microphones in their faces.
Well, most people don't have a chance.
Keep in mind, California is what forty million people, I mean, how many of us actually deal directly with our politicians. So engaged California is going live with a focus on adying victims of the wildfires and Pacific Palisades now Tadina who are struggling to recover. And the comments shared online well could potentially will prompt government action regarding insurance coverage, for example, building standards, efforts to require utilities to bury
power to bury power lines. But herein lies the problem, and that is already at town hall meetings, you get disparate views. You get people in favor, people against any proposed procedure and he proposed law.
You get people that are.
Saying you should change it. And these are the few hundred people that show up. How does government deal with millions or at least hundreds of thousands of comments coming in newsom thinks it's going to help. Maybe, I don't know. It seems like someone has to go through that. This is actually modeled after a program like that in Taiwan, and Taiwanese government loves this thing.
It takes public.
Comments and as a matter of fact, it actually acts on public comments and they view it as pretty valuable stuff. Now, the part that they do use or what they utilize these town forums, this digital town forum in Taiwan, is to stop the disinformation, just shut it. That I think is incredibly valuable because there's so much.
Of that garbage going on, Because well, do we get.
Our news anymore from normal news sources mainstream media, of course. Not. Where we get our news is from the internet, from crazy people. Well, these town halls the government is hosting, it's online. It's the same mechanism, it's the same platform that the crazy people use. And so to straighten out crazy people and conspiracy theories, etc. What the government is doing not just issuing press releases, not just going public, they're going to the same source. They're fighting fire with fire,
and I think that one makes sense. I'm okay with that, so join up and you two can be heard. Also, talk radio used to be the mechanism where people could affect change. This was the days before the Internet and talk radio were people calling in. It was all about Collins. Now your regular Joe, which I don't know why it's a regular Joe. Why not regular George? Never figure that out.
You could write a letter to the editor and how many get printed?
Right?
Three?
But you go on talk radio and you go ahead and spout your views or did spout your views? That was the mechanism because it was all about phone calls. Well, those days are gone, and there is a way for the regular Joe or George to go ahead and have people listen, and that is via the internet now TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, whatever, And unfortunately more influence is now.
There is more.
Influence from the crazy people than there are from the normal people. The only thing I found TikTok I loved was the cinnamon challenge that to me was the best simply the best use of the Internet that.
Has ever pinnacle, yes, pinnacle of the you bet it is people coffing on cinnamon.
Oh yeah, it's just great.
It's well worth looking up the cinnamon challenge. Okay, this segment is about the US Postal Service. Now, government is not particularly trusted by.
The peoples of the United States. The Postal Service is.
It's I think the country's most popular institution, approval rating as high as ninety percent.
Okay, some stats the USPS US Postal.
Service delivers forty eight percent of the world's mail. Half of the world's mail is delivered by the Postal Service one hundred and sixty million homes. So now, what's going on, Well, what happened in March, late March the post of this last late March, the Postal Service struggled to deal with the fallout of the pandemic.
President Trump now threatens.
To veto a version of a bipartisan Cares Act two point two trillion dollars stimulus package that contained a thirteen billion dollar grant to.
The Postal Service.
And the Post Service, saying we need it. We have to keep meeting payroll, we have to gas our vehicles, we have to pay suppliers.
So what he.
Finally signed was a ten billion dollar not a grant, a loan to the Postal Service, which is a quasi into independent agency of the United States, and the ten billion dollars has to be approved by the Treasury Department. Now, the Postal Service has been attacked by conservatives for years. Trump has said the post Office is a joke. This was on Friday, And what he wants to do, like many Republicans, is a go privatization of the Postal Service.
And he keeps on saying that it is a mismanaged business. And so what's being argued now the Trump administration now wants drastic service facilities cuts, more non career labor, more out sourcing, and a rollback of employee benefits, which, of course that's across the board, that's not just Postal Service. And well, the laws have gone south on the Postal Service.
In nineteen seventy, there was actually a wildcat strike that lasted eight days, and so out of that the nineteen seventy Postal Reorganization Act, and what it did is replace the Post Office Department with this semi government, high bred government agency and corporation, and it would provide collective bargaining rights to employees they could unionize. It was supposed to be financially self supporting and continue to provide universal service
at reasonable rates. And the Postal Service had to compete with well now Amazon but FedEx UPS. But the difference is if you live in normal Alaska, UPS doesn't deliver. If you live in an igloo up in Burrough, Alaska, which is the northernmost city in the United States, it's just two feet below the north Pole, the US Postal Service delivers. If someone lives at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.
Do they have postal service? Yeah? Buy mule. Post service still goes down to the bottom of the canyon, and it's the only mule route that the Postal Service has.
Airplanes that fly into these little tiny villages in Alaska at a tremendous loss.
It just costs more. The Postal Service just costs Is that cost a time?
By the way, the Postal Service was created before the United States was Did you.
Know that, Ben Franklin, That was the postal service? Go figure.
I like the Postal Service. I just hate what is that first damp? A first class stamp now cost I think what ninety three cents something like that. Although you can go to costco and buy a roll.
Is it that money? I think it is that high. How much is it? Yeah, oh, it's seventy three cents, So I got it.
And they still lose money at seventy three cents. Where they lose money, they might they make money on the stamps first class, and they lose money in all that third class crap.
What Why is it a quasi government entity?
It's because it's a government run. It's well, it's it became an independent agency sort of because if it's a government agency has to be funded one by the government, and it brings in money, it should be a money a money maker. Most agencies are not money makers. And so it's just there was just a huge move to privatize it completely, and I think it was a compromise, just to compromise issue.
That's my guess on this.
All right, this is KFI AM sixty.
You've been listening to the Bill Handle Show.
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