Goodbye Pacific Palisades, Hello Full Communism

Embattled Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass made her big play this week to rebuild Pacific Palisades in her own image. Needless to say, it won't be pretty.

During what the Los Angeles Times called "a freewheeling half-hour walking tour in Pacific Palisades," with reporters and "chief recovery officer" and former LAPD commissioner Steve Soboroff, Bass announced that the city plans to hire "an outside consultant to handle a significant rebuilding contract for areas devastated by this month’s Palisades fire," as the Times put it.

“They’re going to represent you and make sure that everybody does exactly what they say they’re going to do,” Soboroff told reporters.

Pacific Palisades residents were not so much as consulted on the decision. "Locals have had virtually no input into any of the decisions currently being made by city and state officials," Breitbart's Joel Pollack reported on Tuesday. "Most were only able to access their property for the first time on Monday, after direct intervention by President Donald Trump."

Um… is that how representation works? When the mayor and her philanthropist pal Soboroff pick the firm that will make all the decisions?

Soboroff later clarified to Pollack that "the ‘consultant’ will be an ‘owner’s rep’ to oversee the work of the various agencies involved, much like a construction manager on a building project," and that there "would be a competitive bidding process for the role.”

In other words: this is going to take some time. Rather than a relatively simple process of homeowners filing their insurance claims and rebuilding once the money and the permits come through, big-name consultants will spend big money on big-name contractors to give the Palisades a big government makeover.

Indeed, that's exactly the case.

With homeowners locked out of the process and without any oversight, Bass will pursue her dream of rebuilding the Palisades "in a more equitable and environmentally sustainable way," as she put it. I'm picturing government-spec apartment buildings and other multifamily dwellings on burned-out lots where single-family homes used to stand. Those 15-minute cities don't build themselves, you know — mostly because, given the choice, people reject them.

I was kidding about the Mayor-for-Life thing. Mostly. Nobody likes Bass well enough to repeal the two-term limit that's been in place since 1993. Mostly. Her big play this week will likely have enough money rolling around that it could prove impossible to undo — and cement Bass as a power player for a long time to come.

I was also kidding — mostly — about Bass going Full Communist. But I'm not sure Elon Musk was when he posted Wednesday, "The mayor of LA is going full communist. Recall her before it is too late."

There is a recall petition circulating but there's yet no formal recall process. But with Bass and Soboroff calling the shots on the big-money rebuilding effort, you should expect the big money to back Bass in case of a recall election.

“We’re going to make friends,” Soboroff said on Monday. “We ain’t going to do this without a whole bunch of friends.”

With all that relief money flowing, they're going to make friends, all right — just perhaps not with the devastated residents of Pacific Palisades.