Chris Moritz
speaker
332 appearances
2 recordings
2 series
first heard Nov 2024
last heard Apr 2025
Chris Moritz’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
almost like ancient aristocrats in their in the manner of patron client relationships that define um uh this paradigm and and they have uh you know formed an enormous um uh let's say, power block with tech. And through that connection, California has been ruled by this oligarchy.
Yeah.
The money made it way poorer. What is that? It's a paradox, and it's very interesting.
It instantly became dirty. Like, what is that? This is happening in Southern California too. So in Venice, California, Google has established a big office. And Venice is marred by just tragic levels of homelessness that are shocking, shocking. And sites that I had only seen when traveling to the poorest parts of Guatemala,
Um, maybe worse in some ways, but right around the corner from the Google office in, uh, Venice is a, um, let's call it a shantytown, a favela even maybe, but tent after tent after tent and right next to Google, uh, It's a fascinating dichotomy.
And I was told by someone who would know in the private security sector and a former cop that he has observed, because he has done work for Google, that gang members, local gangs, extract tribute from each homeless tent every single day, $20 to $50 a day. And this is happening, he claims, across the city. There's 75,000 homeless in Los Angeles.
And if they cannot meet the tribute, they are forced to sell drugs or other crimes. And by the way, thanks to, I believe this was a Newsom policy, cops require, have to get search warrants to enter any tents. So the tents have become denizens of, dens rather, of murder, of rape, of drug trafficking. the worst kind of drug trade and other forms of depravity that shocked the senses.
And it's right next to Google. Right next to Google, yeah.
Well, I think that the answer is also structural and economic because tech is not based upon employing vast numbers of people, right? It's not productive labor. Of course. No, I get it. I mean, it's like nine guys from India writing code. I get it. And where do the poor working class people turn to? And housing crisis is also part of it.
So for the rich people, just to reply to your point about it's getting richer and yet worse. Yeah, it's getting richer. But the areas where the rich people live, like Atherton, are looking real nice these days.
Well, because we became a one-party state, right? So when Steve Cooley was DA of Los Angeles— you know, he was not about politics. In fact, he says the job of a DA is not to, you know, kind of bring politics into the administration of justice. It is to go after bad guys and prosecute bad guys and send them away and make the city safer. Yeah, using the laws of the elected legislators, right?
And in fact, local, you know, This was also the case even in San Francisco back in like the 2000s and the predecessor to Kamala Harris, a guy named Hallinan who- Terrence Hallinan. Yeah, right. And he was a liberal, but also like one with a sense of like duty to do the job.
But I think what happened is sometime around like, again, around the late 2000s when Gavin Newsom and Kamala Harris really came into their- to their power structures, and especially San Francisco, it became not about let's make this city better. Let's make this safer. It's about how do I get my next promotion?
You know, I've also heard it's compared to like the fact that we have a full-time legislature versus Texas that has a part-time legislator. And that has a moderating effect. I think that's like a good analog for comparison. I mean, Sacramento is out of control. There's super majorities, Democratic super majorities in both houses. There's not a single Republican at any administrative level.
uh officer level position in the state i think the last one was maybe insurance commissioner right and there are no statewide republican correct office holders that's right yeah there haven't been for years
And our Republicans are weak. I mean, Meg Whitman was pathetic. She spent $150 million of her own money to run for governor in 2010, and she lost overwhelmingly to Jerry Brown.
Oh, yes, I would say so. I mean, the California Republican Party basically doesn't exist. If you want to run as a – you cannot run as a Republican. I mean, for instance – Uh, Rick Caruso ran for mayor, uh, recently. Um, he was, you know, well-known Republican, um, but he had to switch. In Los Angeles. In Los Angeles. Against Karen Bass. Yeah, against Karen Bass.
And, uh, he switched to the Democrats, uh, party, uh, for, to facilitate, you know, the, the run and give him a chance. He still lost, uh, Um, and there's Karen Bass been a pretty great mayor. I mean, this, the board of supervisors, uh, in LA have, you know, a lot more power in some ways, um, than the, um, than, than the mayor itself.
Um, you know, it's kind of, it's the mayor of Los Angeles does not have the power of like the mayor of New York city, um, Um, but you know, I mean, Karen Bass did what she, uh, she, she has done the job she was tasked for, which is to have a black woman as mayor and fulfill an identity politics, um, quota in my opinion.
Yeah, yeah. The only thing that matters is the Democratic primary, of course. And there is, like, internecine... divisions within the party, just like in China. Oh, big time. Right. And in fact, it's kind of interesting that, you know, Gavin is not like on the hard left of the Democratic Party in California. I actually, in some ways, think he's
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