Footage coming out of Equador is straight-up crazy. Gangs taking over live TV broadcasts and huge firefights in the streets. It became Mexico 2 seemingly overnight. Imagine looking out your window in the morning to this.
I maintain the post-pandemic instability is continuing. It's similar to the 2009 economic fuckery leading to the Arab Spring, Occupy, Tea Part and a host of other movements in 2010-11. Ecuador wasn't exactly in great shape to begin with, but not as bad as other places in the region. I can imagine the shocks coming from fuel prices, fertilizer prices, grain prices, and the cascading effect of that on all aspects of the economy hit places that were marginal harder than places that were truly well fucked beforehand. IE, these folks are reacting more violently to backsliding than another blow to an already fragile system. I'd be looking at similar shit happening in Africa, SE Asia, some of the smaller places on the Indian subcontinent, and in regions already getting up-fucked by climate change (Central America & the Caribbean). Also, this coming at a time when the international community is...not enthused about providing aid on top of the Ukraine and Israel conflicts.... All my think tank buddies are telling me 2024 is going to be a wild fucking year. Buckle up, kids....
There's a very strong correlation between a rise in global food prices and fighting in the Middle East.
I told my wife the same thing. Like, for some strange reason ( not just the elections, but... ) I have this weird feeling that things are going to get really bad this year.
Literally the reason that first guy set himself on fire to kick off the entire Arab Spring. But I do wonder how a future Spring would propagate; the previous benefited from Twitter users on the ground, and now Elon owns it backed by Saudi money. Information control.
Ecuador and them are about to take a page from El Salvador, Bukele's crime busting measures. Essentially, fuck a civil right, all you Mara fucks are going to a prison so bad even Joe Arpaio would hesitate. And it works, crime is way down. And if some poor kid with no gang ties happened to get snagged in the net, oh well...?
Social media is generally blocked in Iran for everyone that doesn't know VPNs exist or doesn't want to get caught using one. Arab Spring-style protests never really have a chance of doing anything. Iran's military is specifically designed to primarily quell its own people first, external forces second. They don't want another revolution like the one that brought the current regime into power.
I can't remember who it was that disagreed with me when I said that CA has so many homeless people because they make it easy to be homeless here but we just upped our game a little bit. Giving them a tent city in what use to be a great family park along the river wasn't enough so a new site with plumbing, showers and sleeping cabins/trailers with heating/AC is being constructed. Gee, can't figure out why we have apprx 10,000 homeless people in this city.
Does anyone have any ideas/ theories about the solution to the homelessness problem? Yes, a large driving factor is out of control housing prices. But I think that GTE will agree with me that most of these homeless people are addicts, mentally ill, or both? If you give a dope fiend a house, they're going to fuck it up; I've seen it happen. What's the solution for a bunch of people who can't/ won't manage their own lives?
Right now my city is looking to create housing for this demographic. It’s crazy expensive because it NEEDS to have full time supervision, policing, and medical services. You can’t just give them a place to sleep because they will fight and OD. As much as our city councillors won’t say it like that, they use those reasons for justifying the mandatory inclusion of those 24x7 services that I don’t seem to require in my house. It’s all kinds of fucked up.
The big problem is that while the most visible homeless need way more than just a home, there's a huge unseen mass of homeless that are mostly functional and scraping by by living in cars, crashing on couches, etc. They're basically the lowest segment of the working poor. Housing prices put the squeeze on this group the hardest, and as a result they end up taking the lion's share of the support resources dedicated to the homeless population. If you can get housing prices under control, a large number of this group will be able to afford housing again, and you can redirect your homeless resources toward the most desperate cases. Right now we're spending all our money trying to keep the working poor afloat, and tossing the addicts/mentally ill a band aid and an arrest when they get too far out of line. Bringing down housing prices won't fix an addiction or a mental illness, but it'll take a huge amount of pressure off the system, to allow us to focus more on the most needy cases.
In the city near where I live, they're seeing an increase in homelessness just like every where else is. The city had one or two shelters, which eventually closed down because it wasn't safe for the people working there. Apparently our homeless folk don't like rules, and were bringing in weapons, drugs and whatever else. So the people running the shelters said "fuck this" and closed down. A lot of them are drug addicts or mentally ill, but I'd argue an equal amount of them choose to live that way. There's more than enough opportunity in this state for someone who wants to get back on their feet. But they won't. I don't mean to sound as callous as I'm sure I do, but it's fucking ridiculous anymore. And the argument about housing shortages doesn't hold water with me, because a lot of these people would destroy any place they're given to live.
There's definitely a segment of the homeless that can't or won't live independently, even if gifted housing. What addressing the housing shortage does is twofold: 1. It frees up funding for the more aggressive interventions these types of homeless need. 2. It prevents people from falling into this kind of homelessness in the future. The best way to deal with a drug addiction is to never start, and the best way to treat the mentally ill is to get them on their meds while they're still living a stable lifestyle. Financial stress and loss of housing are gateways to drug addictions and failing to manage a mental health condition.
Back when I ran that shop that was downtown, you could pretty accurately group the homeless into two groups. Over middle aged was almost always mental issues or booze. 20-30 years old was almost always addicts. I have no idea how to solve it but if the states plan was to spend a fuck ton on money on the problem and then have the problem get 50% worse, then their plan sucks donkey dong and we need to try something else. I know three people personally who got addicted to pills, then meth, then harder stuff until they burned every bridge and helping hand and ended up homeless. I don't know a single person that fell on hard times, ended up homeless and then decided to become a junkie. Edit- Like @walt said, there are numerous programs to help someone get back on their feet if they really wanted to. But, they'd rather just get free room and board, their Govt money and just melt their brains everyday.
I cannot speak for other states, but California's crisis began in 1967 when then Governor Ronald Reagan killed money to Mental Health in order to balance a budget. It stayed dead when court cases came down that people could not be committed against their will. After Proposition 13 passed which has artificially inflated housing prices in California you have what is happening now. I recently spoke at our City Council and said if you want to reverse the homless problem, put money into mental health care, allow people to be committed against their will in mental health and reverse proposition 13. Then in 40 to 50 years the problem will be reversed. It was not well received.