Governor Gavin Newsom complains about the politicization of California’s wildfires. But these fires are the consequence of his politics—the politics of woke progressivism. The consequences of ideology in the actions of powerful people (more accurately in the hands of those who have been given power because of their subservience to it) are inherently political. Newsom and his crowd are to blame for the catastrophe. The tactic of depoliticization to meant to create the illusion that the situation is not political by claiming that others are politicizing it, and they do this not only to stay in power, but to keep in place the policies that created the problem.
I am not going to provide a detailed analysis of an unfolding situation for that very reason—it’s unfolding. But I do want to acknowledge the unfolding situation and make a few comments about it. At this point, we can draw some conclusions.
Putting the matter charitably, this situation is in large measure the result of misguided environmentalism. Donald Trump was right when he explained the problem to Joe Rogan on the latter’s podcast in October 2024. But this wasn’t the first time Trump had said this. Back in August of 2020, for instance, he told a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, “I see again the forest fires are starting.” Like an oracle, he continued: “They’re starting again in California. I said, you gotta clean your floors, you gotta clean your forests—there are many, many years of leaves and broken trees and they’re like, like, so flammable, you touch them and it goes up.”
Here is Trump saying it to Newsome’s face in November 2018:
Politicians and the punditry make fun of Trump’s criticism of forest management. “Come on, man!” was the response of out-going president Joe Biden, mocking Trump’s observation that California “sweep” the forest floor. Representations of Trump’s criticism dwell on the phrase “rake the forest.” They did this Trump’s COVID-19 response. They had Trump telling Americans to “inject bleach” and “drink fishtanks cleaner.” They had Rogan eating “horse paste.”
However, Trump did indeed recommend raking and sweeping the forest floor, and for good reason: effective forest management can significantly reduce the severity and spread of wildfires in areas like California. While it may not be possible to prevent all wildfires (it’s not, if we’re honest), proper management strategies can greatly mitigate their effects.
The consequences of the current wildfires is not the result of global warming, as progressives tell us, but the result of government failure to properly maintain California’s forests, and because elites have diverted water to the Pacific—water shortages have hampered firefighting efforts. Trump has also talked about California’s water policy.
What about the problem DEI in firefighting? That also plays a role in preparedness. There is a need to hire based on aptitude, attributes, integrity, and talents, not on the basis of identity. If a woman can fight fires alongside the men and do so effectively, then by all means she should be allowed do so. But lowering standards so more women can fight fires alongside men undermines preparedness. The need for strength and stamina in this occupation (and many others) tells us that, by and large, it is men we seek for this role, and men within a certain distribution of attributes and skills.
Even in the face of such obvious truths, progressives insist that we blame the fires on the abstraction of climate change. They do this to divert attention from their failure to properly manage the forests and the consequences of California’s water policy, and the institution of DEI.
This situation is not merely due to incompetence and bad policy, but because those who push the climate change narrative, and woke progressivism more generally, have influenced authorities to formulate and establish destructive policies. We can’t control the wind. We can’t stop crazy people and saboteurs (often the same person) from setting fires. We have to know what we can control and get ideology out of preparedness.
Why Californians continue to vote for politicians and policymakers who fail them testifies to the power of partisan politics and the role of woke ideology in making people stupid. The best thing any man can do is get as far away from progressive thinking as he possibly can and insist that society replace ideology with common sense and practical science and reap the benefits of reason and truth. California is on its way to being a failed state (which probably explain why Canada wants to annex it, along with other failing states such as Minnesota, Oregon, and Washington).
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Progress is being stymied by those suffering from the imposed idiocy of ideology—and others are made to suffer on account of it. They call the stupidity “progressive” to convey what is not there, a genuine commitment to progress for the sake of humanity.
It’s no accident that progressivism emerges in the United States during the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century at the same time the conscious and intentional manipulation of public attitudes via manufacture of propaganda (renamed “public relations”) emerges. Progressivism presents itself as a reform movement aimed at addressing problems associated with corporate governance, for example political corruption. These are problems that cannot be denied. The ideology is designed to obscure the harmful effects of corporate power, which is inherently corrupting, and to handle the problem of popular resistance to the situation corporate personhood produces. It’s why the crime of bribery is sublimated as the normal practice of campaign finance. Etcetera.
Progressivism should refer to the belief in human progress, modernization, and social improvement, and the popular governance structures that will realize these commitments in our daily lives. But it’s a common propaganda tactic to conceal the opposite of what something is by calling it what it is not—and accusing those wise to the deceit of “politicizing” what it really is.
freedom and reason 