Speaker 1: Something's not right here. Crime is up all over the.
Speaker 2: State, the homeless and the city is out of control.
Speaker 2: The economy is sick, axes are high.
Speaker 3: Housing as expensive, and businesses are leaving. Leaving California means fixing.
Speaker 1: And John Phillips is just the man to lead the charge.
Speaker 4: It's the Fix California Hour with John Phillips and Randy.
Speaker 1: Wag and we continue at one oh five in the
Speaker 1: afternoon on The John Phillips Show, Mister Randy Weggs and
Speaker 1: Culver City.
Speaker 5: Uh.
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Speaker 3: The premieres right after we sign off at three. All right, Johnny,
Speaker 3: we're gonna have to do this on the air. Pat,
Speaker 3: we thought Jim Lacy was at two, but he's called
Speaker 3: in now. So do we want to take him now?
Speaker 3: Let's take him right now? Okay, all right.
Speaker 1: It is a pleasure to welcome our next guest to
Speaker 1: the program. He is the author of the book tax Affordia,
Speaker 1: which is available online at Amazon dot com. He's also
Speaker 1: the publisher of the California Political Review. You can read
Speaker 1: that online at Capoliticalreview dot com and follow him on
Speaker 1: exit James V. Lacy one, Jim Lacy, thanks so much
Speaker 1: for stopping by.
Speaker 2: I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 2: I do have receipts that say one. But if you
Speaker 2: guys want me to hang up, I could just call you.
Speaker 1: No no, no, no no no, if go ahead.
Speaker 2: Like I like the Katie Porter bibblehead. I see that
Speaker 2: recently she's become a commentator on CNN. Looks like she's
Speaker 2: lost some weight. I think she's probably stopped eating all
Speaker 2: those steamed mashed potatoes that she used to eat.
Speaker 3: I'm pulling in to the bakery.
Speaker 1: Well, truth be told, Jim, Truth be tall. Randy claims
Speaker 1: it's a bobblehead doll. It looks more like a nutcracker
Speaker 1: to me, a little dean. That's great.
Speaker 2: Well, uh, you know better that she would be a
Speaker 2: commentator on CNN than still be elected to Congress. I mean,
Speaker 2: she's really gotten cream now a couple of times. She's
Speaker 2: got to have something else that she can do in
Speaker 2: her life. You know, she's got a good education, and
Speaker 2: she's been a law for at UCI. I was thinking
Speaker 2: maybe she'd become a consultant to the Democratic Socialists of California,
Speaker 2: but going on CNN as a consultant is probably about
Speaker 2: the same thing.
Speaker 1: Well, let's go ahead and talk about the DSA, because
Speaker 1: last night they had a big victory in the state
Speaker 1: of Minnesota where their candidate defeated Angie Craig. Peggy Flanagan
Speaker 1: was her name, and she is a far left lieutenant
Speaker 1: governor in the state of Minnesota. She is now going
Speaker 1: to be the Democratic nominee in that race. In Wisconsin,
Speaker 1: things didn't work out for the DSA like they'd hoped
Speaker 1: they would, were their candidate for governor, who was expected
Speaker 1: to win by north of twenty points, ended up losing
Speaker 1: that race by less than a point. In a nail
Speaker 1: bider to just a traditional Democratic candidate. What do you
Speaker 1: make of the success that the DSA has been experience
Speaker 1: and sying in recent elections and do you see them
Speaker 1: on the ascendancy?
Speaker 2: Well, I think that it has a lot to do
Speaker 2: with where they run, and I think that they are
Speaker 2: in an ascendancy. But they're in an ascendency that is
Speaker 2: more like mimicked by in history by the Tea Party
Speaker 2: success with Republican congressional candidates in twenty ten, twenty twelve,
Speaker 2: and by the Freedom Caucus success with candidates. And this
Speaker 2: is where I see it going. I see the DSA.
Speaker 2: My focus is on the US House of Representatives. I
Speaker 2: see the DSA having enough success to be able to
Speaker 2: elect at least six to eight maybe more. They've got
Speaker 2: six to eight right now strong members of Congress that
Speaker 2: they might slightly build on and that might have a
Speaker 2: significant outlier influence on Hakeem Jeffries as speaker. This happened
Speaker 2: with the Tea Party very successfully, where Mark Meadows took
Speaker 2: out John Bayner as the speaker in roughly twenty fourteen
Speaker 2: twenty fifteen, and then they struggled to find a more
Speaker 2: conservative person to put in as speaker and it ended
Speaker 2: up being Paul Ryan, so it wasn't a great success.
Speaker 2: And then you had the Freedom Alliance coming back and
Speaker 2: making McCarthy go through fifteen rounds of votes before they
Speaker 2: were able to settle on putting him in. And what
Speaker 2: they got in return was the you know, was the
Speaker 2: motion to vacate by one vote, which destroyed McCarthy's speakership
Speaker 2: a few months later. What I see happening is is
Speaker 2: that the DSA people are going to come into the
Speaker 2: Congress with this long list of things about defunding police,
Speaker 2: having you know, free medicare for all and so on
Speaker 2: and so forth, and what they'll end up agreeing on
Speaker 2: and what Jeffreys will give up in order to get
Speaker 2: the speakership is basically to defund Israel. And there's going
Speaker 2: to be blood on the hands of the US Congress
Speaker 2: should the Democrats take control of the House in the
Speaker 2: next election, as they likely do, as history will say,
Speaker 2: because that's going to be the negotiating point. The point
Speaker 2: that they're all going to be able to agree on,
Speaker 2: and that Jefferies is going to give up on is
Speaker 2: going to be stopping aid to Israel, particularly military aid.
Speaker 2: Let me mention one other thing about Wisconsin. I don't
Speaker 2: see this guy Crowley getting elected governor Wisconsin now. Is
Speaker 2: that as important as the Senate race in Minnesota? Know,
Speaker 2: But Wisconsin, if you go by the Democrats identity politics,
Speaker 2: although Crowley's been elected, Wisconsin is only about five percent black.
Speaker 2: And certainly that doesn't mean that he can't get elected
Speaker 2: or won't get elected, or that there's not a lot
Speaker 2: of vote, but he doesn't have a real strong within
Speaker 2: the Democratic Party, doesn't have a real strong identity base.
Speaker 2: You know, they're all based on, you know, identity, you know,
Speaker 2: whether you check the boxes of being a woman or
Speaker 2: a gay, or some other ethnicity, or you know, religion
Speaker 2: Muslim or Christian or whatever. So I think I actually
Speaker 2: think that the situation in Wisconsin turned out good for
Speaker 2: the Republicans because there's a fractured Democratic Party with a
Speaker 2: candidate running that really doesn't have a very strong base.
Speaker 2: So I think that the Republicans will come back. It's
Speaker 2: going to be very mixed, But I do believe that
Speaker 2: the DSA is going to have a very negative impact
Speaker 2: in the US Congress going forward, and it's going to
Speaker 2: be all about Israel.
Speaker 1: What do you make of the Democratic strategy of taking
Speaker 1: on these DSA candidates in the primary, where so far,
Speaker 1: at least they've seen extremely hesitant outside of the woman
Speaker 1: in Michigan on taking them on on the issues where
Speaker 1: the DSA says that capitalism has failed, so we need socialism,
Speaker 1: and the Democratic candidates aren't making the case for capitalism.
Speaker 1: The DSA candidates say we should have no border. The
Speaker 1: Democratic candidates aren't making the case for a strong and
Speaker 1: secure border. The DSA candidates are saying we should get
Speaker 1: rid of prisons. The Democratic candidates aren't making the argument
Speaker 1: in favor of prisons to lock criminals up in It
Speaker 1: seems as if their line of attack is strictly related
Speaker 1: to electability, where they're going to their primary voters and
Speaker 1: they're saying, if you elect a DSA candidate, they will
Speaker 1: likely lose to a Republican in the general and that's
Speaker 1: why you shouldn't vote for him. Instead of saying you
Speaker 1: shouldn't vote for the DSA candidate because their ideas are bad,
Speaker 1: ind is are better.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that there's a couple points to be
Speaker 2: made here. First, of all, the positions that the DSA
Speaker 2: take that are so alarming, that have been listed again
Speaker 2: and again, and that we're familiar with about defunding the police,
Speaker 2: about not having any prisons, about medicare for all and
Speaker 2: so on and so forth. Are not that distant from
Speaker 2: the progressive from what we used to call progressive Democrats
Speaker 2: before the DSA came on the scene in the mainstream media.
Speaker 2: So I think that the one issue is that the
Speaker 2: people that were allowing the media to call moderate Democrats
Speaker 2: really aren't moderate Democrats. They're progressive Democrats who don't happen
Speaker 2: to necessarily accept all of the democratic socialist principles, largely
Speaker 2: because if they did, they wouldn't get reelected. They they'd
Speaker 2: probably be an enough people who in the independence and
Speaker 2: within the own Democratic Party that wouldn't that wouldn't accept that. So,
Speaker 2: you know, I think that that's one thing. The other
Speaker 2: thing is is that you're seeing the savvy democrat socialist
Speaker 2: candidates like l say ed back away from some of
Speaker 2: the issues. So he's now telling voters in Michigan, well,
Speaker 2: I'm not I'm not really a socialist. Well why is
Speaker 2: he saying he's not? And it's not exactly it's a
Speaker 2: little bit more substantive than saying I'm now in favor
Speaker 2: of Thanksgiving, because I don't necessarily think he's been out
Speaker 2: there saying that he's against Christmas or Thanksgiving, but you
Speaker 2: do see him backing away, and I and I think
Speaker 2: that that what they're looking for in doing that is
Speaker 2: all political, is just plausible deniability. The bottom line is
Speaker 2: is that I do think that there are very significant
Speaker 2: parallels to the challenges to the establishment Republicans that the
Speaker 2: Tea Party and that the as I said said earlier,
Speaker 2: the risk of repeating myself, and that the Freedom Caucus presented.
Speaker 2: It's just that what these democratic socialists are talking about
Speaker 2: are things that are actually dangerous. They're immature, they're not
Speaker 2: well thought out, the childish, and in this danger we
Speaker 2: see that the establishment Democrats, who in my opinion, are
Speaker 2: not moderates, the establishment progressive, they don't have spine. Their
Speaker 2: whole strategy of election in the last three cycles has
Speaker 2: been to simply attack Trump, and in that process they've
Speaker 2: lost their ability to come forward with important policy issues
Speaker 2: and pass them. You know, don't tell me that the
Speaker 2: Inflation Reduction Act or that the Chips Act during the
Speaker 2: Biden administration were some great, wonderful you know, Franklin Delan
Speaker 2: or Roosevelt type legislative achievements. They absolutely work. The Inflation
Speaker 2: Reduction Act of Biden resulted in nine percent inflation, the
Speaker 2: highest inflation that we've had in decades. So they're devoid
Speaker 2: of policy. There's probably a strong anti Trump base out there,
Speaker 2: we know it because of the favorability and so on
Speaker 2: and so forth. It's probably not necessarily large enough for
Speaker 2: them to completely totally take over the House or to
Speaker 2: win a presidential election right right now, even with Trump's
Speaker 2: favorabilities going down somewhat. But they're just vapid. The mainstream
Speaker 2: Democrats just lack policy, and that's why the DSA is
Speaker 2: doing so well.
Speaker 1: Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi just participated in a Politico
Speaker 1: forum where she talked about how she got Joe Biden
Speaker 1: out of the race, and she said what she did
Speaker 1: was she called him up. I guess they met. They
Speaker 1: brought the rosary each of them, and she said, what
Speaker 1: you're doing isn't working. Your pollsters are giving you bad information.
Speaker 1: I want you to talk to my pollsters to understand
Speaker 1: what the public actually thinks about you. And the public
Speaker 1: thinks that you are not physically capable of being president.
Speaker 1: For four more years, so you need to have a
Speaker 1: physical and you need to release those results. Then she
Speaker 1: went on Morning Joe on MSNBC, and she said that
Speaker 1: the president needs to make up his mind if he's
Speaker 1: staying in the race or not. After he said he's
Speaker 1: staying in the race, and that's when the floodgates open
Speaker 1: and everyone called on him to resign. He and his
Speaker 1: family blame her and Barack Obama for chasing him out
Speaker 1: of the race. She said she didn't do any such thing.
Speaker 1: She was just asked questions, what do you make of that?
Speaker 2: Well, I know you're a political scientist. And just recently,
Speaker 2: the Princeton University issued a very compelling report on the
Speaker 2: presidency of Joe Biden. It's a first hand historical assessment,
Speaker 2: and one of the conclusions that they have is that
Speaker 2: the twenty twenty four elections suggested that Biden fit into
Speaker 2: the category of presidents whom political scientist Stephen Scronneck characterized
Speaker 2: as disjunctive, serving as the last gasp of a regime
Speaker 2: whose time was coming to an end. Nancy Pelosi is
Speaker 2: the center of all of that. Stenny Hoyer, Schumer, Biden
Speaker 2: are well past their primes. They're done with good ideas.
Speaker 2: And I think that whether or not Biden was going
Speaker 2: to flub entirely the debate that he had, if he
Speaker 2: had stayed in the race, I think he would have
Speaker 2: been crushed. I think he would have been crushed even
Speaker 2: worse than Kamala Harris. The people who run the National
Speaker 2: Democratic Party up until that point that you're talking about
Speaker 2: where she goes to see Biden are just too old,
Speaker 2: they're tired out, they're disconnected, and also they're so heavily
Speaker 2: compromised with their involvement with the fundraisers, with the industries
Speaker 2: that fund the Democratic Party, with the unions and so
Speaker 2: on and so forth, that they were creating their own
Speaker 2: disjunctive situation where they were going to have where Biden
Speaker 2: was going to lose and he would have to get
Speaker 2: out of the race in order for them to have
Speaker 2: a chance of winning. And how we ended up with
Speaker 2: Kamela I think had a has a lot to do
Speaker 2: with the other overlay on the Democratic Party involving diversity,
Speaker 2: equity and inclusion. You know, once you get past Biden
Speaker 2: and you push him out, how do you get past
Speaker 2: the notion of not accepting a Democratic presidential candidate from
Speaker 2: the incumbent Vice president who's a black woman who's also
Speaker 2: of Asian descent. You know, they were stuck. They couldn't
Speaker 2: go out and do something better because it was too
Speaker 2: late and because there and because of the yoke of
Speaker 2: the d eiburden that they all bared. So you know,
Speaker 2: they've made a lot of mistakes in the process and
Speaker 2: relying on these people to get elected. You know, Biden
Speaker 2: was a fraud. He wasn't. He was elected as someone
Speaker 2: who would be more of a moderating influence, sort of
Speaker 2: a transition out of the disruption of Trump. He was
Speaker 2: a total failure of it. He actually paved the way
Speaker 2: for the Second Trunk administration and in those four years,
Speaker 2: Steven Miller and Donald Trump and his advisors figured out
Speaker 2: what they needed to do to actually grab and grasp
Speaker 2: control of government. And look what they've done. They've come
Speaker 2: in and they've further disrupted things, I mean very significantly.
Speaker 2: Trump is a consequential president. You know, He's made mistakes
Speaker 2: and he says things that I wish that he wouldn't say.
Speaker 2: And if he didn't say some of the things that
Speaker 2: he said, I think that he'd have far more support.
Speaker 2: But The bottom line is is that the deep state
Speaker 2: has been shook up. The irs all these agencies, they've
Speaker 2: been exposed. The FBI is being fixed, and good riddance.
Speaker 1: Jim Lacy author of the book tax Afordia, available online
Speaker 1: at Amazon dot com or wherever you buy your books.
Speaker 1: You can also follow Jim on x at James V.
Speaker 1: Lacy one and read them online at the California Political
Speaker 1: Review at Capolitical Review dot com. Jim Lacy, thanks so
Speaker 1: much for stopping by. If you'd like to email the show,
Speaker 1: you can do so at Johnny Don't Like Show at
Speaker 1: gmail dot com. That's Johnny Don't Like Show at gmail
Speaker 1: dot com and Randy. If you want to watch us
Speaker 1: perform the show live, you can do so at Johnny
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Speaker 3: episode drops at three o'clock. We interview Susan Crabtree about
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Speaker 1: All right, homeowner's insurance is going to be going up
Speaker 1: in the state of California for homeowners who are already
Speaker 1: paying the most.
Speaker 3: The California Fair Plan is set to enco grease rates
Speaker 3: up to about thirty percent higher than when people are
Speaker 3: already paying for more on this We got to report
Speaker 3: from KPIX in the Bay Area.
Speaker 5: And of course, as these types of wildfires continue to
Speaker 5: threaten homes, fire risk is at the top of mind
Speaker 5: around the state this time of year. And if you're
Speaker 5: one of the hundreds of thousands of home owners who
Speaker 5: get your insurance through the state through the California Fair Plan,
Speaker 5: well you're about to start paying even more. The state
Speaker 5: announcing an average rate hike of almost thirty percent for
Speaker 5: those already paying the highest rates, but is just.
Speaker 3: The highest rates for the least amount of coverage.
Speaker 1: Okay, so whenever we talk to people who were fire
Speaker 1: victims in the Palisades or Altadena and they had the
Speaker 1: Fare Plan or State Farm, almost all of them are
Speaker 1: living through a nightmare where they're going to end up
Speaker 1: having to sue their own insurance company to get what
Speaker 1: they're owed.
Speaker 5: Ramos reports it may actually be good news for the
Speaker 5: state's insurance market.
Speaker 6: This is the town of Rinda. About two years ago,
Speaker 6: when State Farm began shedding policies in California, this was
Speaker 6: the hardest hit place in the state. More than seventeen
Speaker 6: hundred policies were non renewed, and most of those people
Speaker 6: got kicked to the California Fair Plan, and now they're
Speaker 6: about to get some bad news. The announcement came today.
Speaker 6: Effective October fifteenth, all Fair Planned policy holders will see
Speaker 6: a change in their monthly bills.
Speaker 3: Boy, that Ricardo Laura is just doing a heck of
Speaker 3: a job, isn't he. I'm very kind of sketch.
Speaker 1: Imagine getting that letter in the mail. You already have
Speaker 1: the worst insurance policy that's legally allowed to be sold
Speaker 1: in California, and then the cost of that crappy policy
Speaker 1: is going to shoot through the roof too.
Speaker 6: Industry expert Carl Sussman says it was not unexpected.
Speaker 4: Which means some people are going to see plus fifty,
Speaker 4: some might see minus twenty, and it's going to average
Speaker 4: out across all policy holders are about twenty nine point
Speaker 4: one percent.
Speaker 6: That's going to include a lot of people In Rinda.
Speaker 6: Local real estate agent Tom Stack says two years ago,
Speaker 6: people trying to buy a home or keep a mortgage
Speaker 6: were stuck with the Fair Plan.
Speaker 7: There we're surrounded by open space and trees and all this,
Speaker 7: so it became a bit of a panic for people
Speaker 7: and there were no solutions.
Speaker 6: But he says that has changed a bit and he's
Speaker 6: starting to see more options for those looking for insurance.
Speaker 7: So solutions are popping up. There's a lot of private
Speaker 7: market options that are available.
Speaker 3: Now, Adriana or Veronica.
Speaker 1: Either way, you're going to be buying your insurance from
Speaker 1: someone with big boobs on a billboard.
Speaker 7: Out there, because people are finding a need and filling it.
Speaker 6: As the cost of the Fair Plan rises, it provides
Speaker 6: an incentive for insurance companies to begin writing policies again,
Speaker 6: albeit at a higher price.
Speaker 3: Which, by the way, all of this is hilarious to
Speaker 3: me because people might assume that the California Fair Plan
Speaker 3: is a state run insurance program, and it's not. It's
Speaker 3: actually a consortium made up of the insurance companies that
Speaker 3: don't want to write these policies. And one of the
Speaker 3: things that Ricardo Lara did at the end of twenty
Speaker 3: twenty four going into the wildfires in twenty twenty five
Speaker 3: was changed the rules. So it used to be that
Speaker 3: if the Fair Plan wrote too many policies and went
Speaker 3: belly up, the insurers would be on the hook for it.
Speaker 3: Ricardo Lara changed that rule to make sure that the
Speaker 3: ratepayers were on the hook for it, and they could
Speaker 3: pass on the cost of the Fair Plan going belly
Speaker 3: up to the ratepayers.
Speaker 1: And if you're assuming that the only people who are
Speaker 1: forced to buy the Fair Plan live in communities that
Speaker 1: experience extreme fire risk, you're wrong. A friend of mine
Speaker 1: who lives in a condo in the flats of a
Speaker 1: city said that the person who bought the unit below
Speaker 1: him had to go on the fare Plan because the
Speaker 1: Fair Plan was the only company that was willing to
Speaker 1: sell a policy for a condo in the flat, not
Speaker 1: in a fire zone.
Speaker 4: We're going to see the primary carriers back and writing
Speaker 4: those risks. I'm already starting to see it now. But
Speaker 4: I think in general, as homeowners, we have to accept
Speaker 4: that unfortunately we were paying. We were down at the
Speaker 4: fifth or sixth least expensive state in the country for
Speaker 4: property insurance.
Speaker 3: Which this is what we're hearing now, is that you
Speaker 3: don't understand how good you've had it for so long.
Speaker 3: Your insurance rates were artificially low thanks to Prop one
Speaker 3: oh three.
Speaker 1: Where is it cheaper than California? That's what I'd like
Speaker 1: to know.
Speaker 3: Well, maybe they mean like in proportion to what your
Speaker 3: property is worth. Because property values are much higher here
Speaker 3: than the rest of the country. But still don't tell
Speaker 3: me that my policy's cheap. It doubled in the last
Speaker 3: two years, and I live in the valley.
Speaker 4: When you think about it, since we're the ones that
Speaker 4: have the fires and the earthquakes and all sorts of
Speaker 4: other bizarre weather.
Speaker 3: Events, well, every state has some kind of disaster. We
Speaker 3: don't have tornadoes. I've seen a tornado tear up North Dallas,
Speaker 3: which has some very expensive houses.
Speaker 1: We don't have hurricanes, we don't have snow.
Speaker 3: We do have Barber Ferrara though, wash your hands often
Speaker 3: and ovis before eating and after toileting.
Speaker 1: She is a natural disaster. To get easier, that's just
Speaker 1: going to get tougher.
Speaker 6: The new rules will allow insurers to charge based on
Speaker 6: actual risk, which means homes in a forested place like
Speaker 6: Arinda will likely pay more.
Speaker 3: Well, what the rules change that Ricardo Laura gave the
Speaker 3: insurance company that they were asking for was they wanted
Speaker 3: to use their own proprietary private climate modeling that we
Speaker 3: we aren't allowed to see as the public, so they
Speaker 3: could say, well, our modeling shows that Arenda's going to
Speaker 3: get wiped off. The map, So we'll price you out,
Speaker 3: but we're going to triple what you're paying.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and they're modeling would be totally ridiculous. I think
Speaker 1: they're modeling required Al Gore and Greta Thunberg to have
Speaker 1: a love child, and that person could do the predictions.
Speaker 6: But homeowners can reduce that amount by home hardening measures.
Speaker 6: Alfonso Petting with the Natural Resources Defense Council says, that's
Speaker 6: where the state can play an important role.
Speaker 3: But can right now, you can harden your home all
Speaker 3: you want. The insurance companies do not have to lower
Speaker 3: your rates. We have not biked that into any kind
Speaker 3: of legislation or regulation.
Speaker 8: The insurers have no incentive essentially to help homes mitigate
Speaker 8: the hazards. So what that comes back to is what
Speaker 8: can the state do about that? Right the state needs
Speaker 8: to have programs that help incentivize and helps hubsidize maybe
Speaker 8: these hazard mitigation measures and home hardening measures. So that's
Speaker 8: what needs to be done, especially in areas that are
Speaker 8: in danger.
Speaker 3: Which means the fair plan could What's so funny to
Speaker 3: me is it would seem like it would financially make
Speaker 3: sense if you're the insurance company and there is technology
Speaker 3: that you could put in the homes fire defense systems,
Speaker 3: those things that put out foam from the roofs, the
Speaker 3: things that make sure embers don't go into your eves.
Speaker 3: That may cost thousands of dollars that well, if you,
Speaker 3: as the insurance company, bought that for the policy, well
Speaker 3: now you're never going to get a claim. So you're
Speaker 3: making tons of money for years and years and years.
Speaker 3: But no, of course, the insurance company wants you to
Speaker 3: pay through the nose to harden your home, and they
Speaker 3: still want you to pay through the nose for your policy.
Speaker 6: Once again, become what it was intended to be, the
Speaker 6: insurer of last resort for those who cannot lessen the risk,
Speaker 6: and even a place like Arinda can once again and
Speaker 6: have some options, even if they won't be as cheap
Speaker 6: as they once were.
Speaker 7: Some of the big players are trying to find a
Speaker 7: way to get back in again. They're redoing their underwriting,
Speaker 7: they're seeing what's where, what's happening. They're trying to find
Speaker 7: a way to get.
Speaker 3: A piece of that market.
Speaker 7: Because when you mentioned seventeen hundred homes are being struck
Speaker 7: from the roles, well, who's going to handle those seventeen
Speaker 7: hundred homes. Ingenuitive companies are going to come up with solutions.
Speaker 5: So that was John Ramo's reporting from the East Bay.
Speaker 5: So the Fair Plan was asking for a thirty percent
Speaker 5: increase to cover the cost of its growing risk exposure.
Speaker 3: You know, because Ricardo Lauras said I need to do
Speaker 3: all this stuff to depopulate the Fair Plan, and the
Speaker 3: numbers in the Fair Plan went through the roof.
Speaker 1: Did he say that at a DJ Kitty glitter concert?
Speaker 3: I think he did.
Speaker 5: Susman says several large companies already filed to be part
Speaker 5: of the market, and he expects people will leave the
Speaker 5: Fair Plan as private insurers do come back to the
Speaker 5: state and he expects that to begin happening in the
Speaker 5: next few months.
Speaker 3: Well that's what they say. But it's been two years
Speaker 3: now since Ricardo laura put in these policies and we
Speaker 3: really haven't seen a whole lot of change. But we
Speaker 3: have seen is the insurance companies can charge more and
Speaker 3: more and more and more and more and still not
Speaker 3: be held to use everybody's favorite useless word, accountable when
Speaker 3: they deny or slow roll your claims like they did
Speaker 3: in the Palisades or in Altadena or at the campfire.
Speaker 1: No, and every time you get your policy renewal in
Speaker 1: the mail and there's a great big increase. You know,
Speaker 1: these companies are sitting back thinking you just took up
Speaker 1: ambient and smoking. If you're watching us live at Johnny
Speaker 1: don't like dot com, please click that like button. We're
Speaker 1: over two hundred and thirty likes. I'm going to get
Speaker 1: that number as high as possible, So if you haven't
Speaker 1: clicked it, please click it right now. It would help
Speaker 1: us out a lot. All right, here's a shocking headline.
Speaker 1: California's bullet train is in more trouble.
Speaker 3: According to a great piece from our friend Julie Watts
Speaker 3: at CBS News investigates, the High Speed Rail is in
Speaker 3: danger of going broke.
Speaker 1: You don't say, And.
Speaker 3: Of course a lot of this has to do with
Speaker 3: their federal funding getting cut, which was right to do so,
Speaker 3: because the High Speed Rail promised to buy trains in
Speaker 3: laid track and they have not bought trains in laid track.
Speaker 3: In fact, Gavin Newsom straight up lied about laying track.
Speaker 1: And now Javier Besserra is apparently picking up where Gavin
Speaker 1: left off, and he wants to sue the federal government
Speaker 1: to get more money for a train that doesn't exist.
Speaker 2: Scrub it.
Speaker 3: Well, if you want the support of all the unions
Speaker 3: that have been making so much money off of this
Speaker 3: never ending project, then you're gonna say we're gonna build
Speaker 3: high speed rail. For more on this, we got a
Speaker 3: CBS News California and Julie Watts.
Speaker 7: Did you ever hear of Gavin duskamb that train is
Speaker 7: the worst court overrun I've ever seen?
Speaker 1: How about missing?
Speaker 3: Was that in the meeting with Zelensky?
Speaker 1: Interesting topic disinformation.
Speaker 9: Remember when President Trump pulled four billion in federal funding
Speaker 9: from California's high speed rail and Governor Newsom said it
Speaker 9: was a political attack. Well, it turns out there's more
Speaker 9: of the story. Records revealed California high speed Rail failed.
Speaker 3: He Hey, when Julie was on the show last week,
Speaker 3: that was the corkboard that was behind her.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, we asked her some questions about it too.
Speaker 1: I thought it was a science fair project.
Speaker 9: To do the one thing it promised the Feds, a
Speaker 9: federal judge, and taxpayers it would do by the trains.
Speaker 9: This is the federal funding agreement California.
Speaker 3: All right, we've got props in this video. It is fantastic.
Speaker 3: If you can't watch this live with us right now,
Speaker 3: this video is on my list at Randy Wangradio dot
Speaker 3: substack dot com, give it a watch and share it
Speaker 3: with your friends and family. Julie does such great work
Speaker 3: and we're just trying to spread the word about the
Speaker 3: great reporting.
Speaker 9: Agreed to buy the trains by December thirty one, twenty
Speaker 9: twenty four.
Speaker 3: Wait, John, what year is it.
Speaker 1: It is twenty twenty six right now, over halfway through.
Speaker 3: So then what do they do with that money that
Speaker 3: was set aside to buy the train?
Speaker 1: Good question, It.
Speaker 9: Didn't and there were warning signs.
Speaker 10: There's been some discussion about perhaps redesigning or reconfiguring the
Speaker 10: train sets.
Speaker 9: Less than two months before the deadline. Board members raise
Speaker 9: concerns about the new CEO's plan to change the train
Speaker 9: designs in the middle of the bidding process.
Speaker 10: We may have to cancel that procurement or rewrite a
Speaker 10: new specification.
Speaker 3: Sorry, I'm going to have to interrupt. We are in
Speaker 3: active procurement.
Speaker 9: The lawyer for High Speed Rail shut down the conversation.
Speaker 3: So I'm just going to ask some me not discuss
Speaker 3: it here. I would highly recommend conversations with the CEO.
Speaker 3: If you ever watched one of these High Speed Rail
Speaker 3: Authority board meetings, you'll know that Shanghy was right all along.
Speaker 3: The baraucracy is real.
Speaker 1: Imagine sitting through a long, boring meeting with the High
Speaker 1: speed Rail Authority where you spend all of your time
Speaker 1: talking about a train that doesn't exist.
Speaker 3: And they've been doing it for fifteen years.
Speaker 9: Weeks later, they missed that deadline, which the Trump administration
Speaker 9: pointed to when they pulled the federal funding about six
Speaker 9: months later.
Speaker 3: It's having some fun with the train. This story's great.
Speaker 1: What you do at work today, Julie, I played with toys?
Speaker 3: Hey, at least this actually had they have a train there.
Speaker 3: There's no actual train, but we've got a toy.
Speaker 9: So California suit promising a federal judge and swore in
Speaker 9: court filings it would buy the trains by December one,
Speaker 9: twenty twenty five.
Speaker 3: Wait, John, what year is it again?
Speaker 1: It happens to be twenty twenty six, over halfway through.
Speaker 3: So they were supposed to buy the trains by the
Speaker 3: end of twenty twenty four. They didn't. They lost funding.
Speaker 3: They sued. They told a judge well, we'll buy the
Speaker 3: trains by the end of twenty twenty five, and they didn't.
Speaker 1: That is correct.
Speaker 9: High speed Rail missed that deadline too, canceling the board
Speaker 9: meeting where they were.
Speaker 3: This is the definition of you had one job.
Speaker 1: And they couldn't do it.
Speaker 9: We're supposed to approve the contract. Then, just two days
Speaker 9: before Christmas, California quietly dropped the lawsuit, this time no
Speaker 9: press release, just a couple sentences buried on the high
Speaker 9: speed Rail website saying the Trump administration was not a
Speaker 9: reliable partner.
Speaker 3: You know, they always say, if you want to get
Speaker 3: out of a news cycle, you bury your story on
Speaker 3: a Friday. If you really want no attention for a
Speaker 3: news story, you do it on the friday before Christmas.
Speaker 3: I couldn't have commented on it. I was gallivanting in Amsterdam.
Speaker 9: Why did we pull the lawsuit?
Speaker 8: That was a client matter.
Speaker 9: It was appropriate for us to pull the lawsuit. That's
Speaker 9: California Attorney General Rob Bonte.
Speaker 3: Okay. I just have to point something out, and this
Speaker 3: is something that you only see if you're watching it
Speaker 3: on the video, and it's just it's interesting. So there's
Speaker 3: video of Julie Watts asking Bob Bonta back in January
Speaker 3: about why he dropped the lawsuit for high speed rail,
Speaker 3: and he claimed this wasn't the state suing. He was
Speaker 3: suing on behalf of the high speed rail. But Johnny,
Speaker 3: think of all the pictures and videos that we've seen
Speaker 3: of Bob Bonta just in the last two or three months,
Speaker 3: and then look at him in January. How did his
Speaker 3: hair get so white so fast?
Speaker 1: It's almost as if he's really worried about something that
Speaker 1: could potentially be catastrophic for his career.
Speaker 3: Bob Bonta, that Shangy trials coming up real soon. Kids
Speaker 3: end of October.
Speaker 9: The Governor's State of the State, a couple weeks after
Speaker 9: he dropped the lawsuit.
Speaker 10: Meanwhile, I debated whether or not to include this.
Speaker 9: This is what the governor had to say that day
Speaker 9: about the status of high speed rail.
Speaker 10: Russell Lane tracks playing tracks in the nation's first high
Speaker 10: speed rail system, except they weren't.
Speaker 1: But here, in a one party state, you can just
Speaker 1: say whatever you want and get away with it.
Speaker 3: For as much as people love to give flak to
Speaker 3: the media for not fact checking, our dear leader, the
Speaker 3: Warden newsome there it is right there. CBS News investigates
Speaker 3: calling out Gavin for straight up lying about laying tracks.
Speaker 9: To be clear, there are no high speed rail tracks
Speaker 9: laid as of today, no yet.
Speaker 10: No.
Speaker 9: That is the High Speed Rail Inspector General six months
Speaker 9: after the governor's State of the State address. And this
Speaker 9: is not high speed rail track that Newsom and the
Speaker 9: CEO are hammering nails into. It's a prop.
Speaker 3: So we spend money on a fake track, a fake system,
Speaker 3: so Gavin could have a photo op. And that was
Speaker 3: back in the beginning of twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1: How is this not a bigger scandal.
Speaker 3: Well, we're all trying to make sure that it is.
Speaker 3: What we're at. Our job here is to bring attention
Speaker 3: to these stories. Julie works her butt up, as you
Speaker 3: can see, she's been doing this story for months and
Speaker 3: months and months. It's our job to let you know
Speaker 3: about it, and it is your job to share this
Speaker 3: story on your social media feeds with your friends and
Speaker 3: your family. It is an attention economy, and everyone gets
Speaker 3: so distracted by what's going on in Washington, DC and
Speaker 3: what's going on in Iran. But this is a massive
Speaker 3: scandal and it needs more attention. So we all got
Speaker 3: to do our part and pay attention to it and
Speaker 3: share it.
Speaker 9: As for the trains, they're still officially listed as tbds
Speaker 9: that are expected to take at least four years to
Speaker 9: manufacture at least another two to test.
Speaker 3: They're not making this twenty thirty three deadline for Fresno.
Speaker 3: That's not happening.
Speaker 1: We are never writing the screen.
Speaker 9: Nope, a countdown that was supposed to begin back in
Speaker 9: twenty twenty four.
Speaker 3: I would highly recommend conversations with the CEO.
Speaker 9: Governor Newsom and High Speed Rail didn't answer our questions
Speaker 9: about the reason for the delays. They did send us
Speaker 9: a copy of a Biden era federal review that found
Speaker 9: no fraud, waste, or abuse, but that was before these
Speaker 9: miss deadlines under the new CEO for CBS California Investigates.
Speaker 9: I'm Julie Watts.
Speaker 3: That is an incredible piece of reporting. The High Speed
Speaker 3: Rail is broke and they lost the money for good reason.
Speaker 3: They didn't spend any of the money on what they
Speaker 3: were supposed to except for Gavin Newsom's props.
Speaker 1: What a boondoggle. This in and of itself should end
Speaker 1: his presidential ambitions.