🚀 go-pugleaf

"Charles P. Hobbs" <transit@primenet.com> wrote:

>>
>>Chas, one reason LA will never be as great a city as New York is that
>>it is filled with small minded people who choose to look no further
>>than their own backyards. When chief Parker told Angelinos he could
>>maintain order, keep the blacks in South-Central and the Mexicans in
>>East LA, all for the price of policing Mayberry, Angelinos (white
>>ones, that is) accepted his vision uncritically, permitting the
>>creation of a tiny, elite appearing police department staffed by
>>officers who personally despise Los Angeles, wouldn't live in it, and
>>feel perfectly comfortable threatening not to do their jobs--but will
>>still accept city paychecks--if they aren't worshipped with sufficient
>>fervor. 
>>
>I don't know if NYC cops are better, from what I hear, some of them are
>bad in their own way.

True. Economic corruption has, and will probably continue to be, a
major problem here. But NYPD interacts with people in real situations
much better than LAPD. A big part of that--not to mention what makes
NY different from LA in general--is their presence as pedestrians,
using the same sidewalks, shops, benches, etc., as those who pay their
salaries. LAPD's biggest problem is size--LA's so large, and the
department is so small. But so too is the Valley, and given the
Valley's enthusiastic support of Prop 13 and Pete Wilson, it's
impossible to believe that Valley residents will be willing to
adequately fund a department of their own.

>>One of the most striking differences between New York and LA is that
>>here is very much a sense of shared destiny: Good, bad or indifferent,
>>New York's boroughs are going where they're going together. We do not
>>hear suggestions that the Bronx, for all of its problems, be cut loose
>>to sink or swim or explode as it will. Police, and other emergency
>>professionals, know how to interact with real people in real
>>situations. They are not handsome, dangerous automatons.

>No, but I haven't heard of any real influx of people from, say, Long
>Island, wanting to move there.

No need. LI, like the Valley, is undergoing urbanization, probably
well beyond the desires of its residents, but there is little they can
do about it. The population of the world is not decreasing.

>Also, does the name Howard Beach mean anything to you? What about
>Crown Heights? Ask on misc.transport.urban.transit why some of the
>highway bridges in certain parts of New York are too low to let a
>city bus pass under them . . .

The Crown Heights' disturbances were no where near the level of either
LA riot. CH is very segregated today with Eastern Parkway as the
'border', but the feel of it is not unpleasant. Anger and
misunderstandings between Blacks and Chasidim did occur, fueled by
media. But today, both groups share public transportation, elected
officials, tax rates, etc., and this is at least part of what permits
them to live alongside one another.  Were Crown Heights to somehow
succeed from New York City, then divide again along EP, then I would
seriously worry about the future of both groups. Some unpleasantness
is bound to happen from time to time--no one ever promised diversity
would be free of consequences.

>>What LA needs, more than anything, is greater civic pride, a sense of
>>shared history (and it's very much the fault of easterners who
>>relocate to LA and environs and who claim LA has no history or no core
>>that we lack this sense)

>Again, mostly people wanting LA to be something it's not. . . 

Here I don't understand... Do you mean the easterners judging LA by
eastern standards, or those of us who feel it's time for LA to step up
to the plate as one of the world's great metropolises?

>> and, mainly, a sense of shared destiny. How
>>to provide that sense is beyond yours truly. Perhaps it will never
>>occur, any such impulse lost amid the howling clamour of short sighted
>>sectarianism. And this is LA's greatest tragedy. It can be a great
>>city, greater than New York, or any that has come before. But its
>>denizens, by and large, can see no futher than their own geraniums.
>>
>Again, I'm not quite sure you can really have that in *any* large,
>multicultural city. There are too many diverse interests competing
>with one another . . .

So long as people pay their taxes and obey the laws and identify
themselves as Angelinos (or New Yorkers or Chicagoans or whatever),
they needn't live atop each other. Chabad Lubavitchers in Crown
Heights live apart from other groups entirely by choice. It may be
that the price of maintaining an identity within the context of a
larger society is periodic conflict. New York, Chicago, Boston and
other major cities have all suffered racial tensions, crime, and
generalized unrest. But their solutions have not involved rampant
sectarianism. New York's decrease in crime was not effected by cutting
away those portions that made the statistics look bad and then
recounting.

>>Ironically, or not, Chief Parker died in 1965, the very year his
>>policies and philosophy were proven tragically wrong. New municipal
>>borders will not prevent those who Valleyites fear the most from
>>someday avenging themselves upon the elite who left them behind. 
>>
>Guess what, "they" are already here. If you left the Valley in
>1994, you obviously should have noticed. . . 

Uh, noticed what? That people other than white anglos live in the
Valley now? Sure did.  I wonder, in fact, why Valley successionists
assume that the Valley itself won't become balkanized in time (well,
it already is), and that Tarzana won't decide to break away and form a
city of mostly Middle Eastern people, and Pacoima won't decide to
break away and form a Spanish speaking city (especially as Spanish
language material seems to engender so much hostility in CA right now
thanks largely to Beat His Meat Pete in Sac).

Succession is a bad precedent, both for LA, California (how about
NoCal breaking away and deciding to keep their water... that would
probably render any discussion about LA or SoCal totally moot) and the
US. As a nation and a geographic entity we can probably not be
defeated or destroyed except from within. We are our own worst
enemies, and always have been.

I agree with Michael Higby--eliminate the county structure and form a
megacity. That might be Quixotic, given the power of the County
Supervisors who might, just conceivably object to such a plan. But LA
is a Quixotic place, always will be.

Andy Katz

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