Beware the Snake Oil Salesman

In the Old West, the Snake Oil Salesman was a mainstay.  The "Wizard of Oz", that was a political commentary by the way, begins with a traveling Snake Oil salesman, seeking to sell rain making equipment.  It all turns out to be a con in the end!

During the Dust Bowl days, crooks masquerading as scientists, traveled the Great Plains, trying to get commuities to buy their con, taking bankrupt communities to the cleaners, while producing no rain.  

They were con artists, living barely inside the law, profiting on human misery.

We see those things today; politicians who put on a great show, make loads of promises, and back up half truths with "facts", but really are trying to pick your pocket.

It looks like we have that in my home town of Redding, California.  

We have a new police chief from Stockton.  He is handsome, a great talker, and seems to love having "public forums" where he paces back in forth, with his form fitting uniform, immaculately groomed, almost military (he brags about his service and present Reservist position), and wows the audience with his statistics and hyperbole.

And boy is it hyperbole.   The newspaper this morning, certainly no liberal rag, pointed out that some of the chief's "statistics" about the motivations for homeless people coming to Redding were shall we say, in the "snake oil salesman" territory.

The easiest way I make sense of it, besides just calling it plain old bullshit, is that of 3000 homeless in Redding less than 100 said they were here because of bleeding heart liberal give away services.

Now, Redding is accused of a lot of things, but bleeding heart liberal is NOT one of them.  

Redding is one of the most conservative places in California.  Shasta County was designated by the San Jose Mercury News, as the "gun capitol" of California.  We have not elected a Democrat to any major public office, save a couple non partisan seats on the City Council, for over thirty years.

But that is not reactionary enough for the Police Chief.  No, he uses barely laughable statistics to push for a wholesale deportation of homeless, raiding their camps, bull dozing their tents.   Some of the local mega churches in town even joined in, Christians smashing homeless camps (how there is a sermon title for you).  

But, and there is always a but, somebody crept into the Wizard's office, and drew back the curtain and lo and behold, there stood not a Wizard, but a Snake Oil Salesman!

None of the Chief's "statistics" make any sense.  First of all, he supposedly had his police officers collect statistical evidences about why the homeless came to Redding.  Now think about that for a minute, a big guy with a gun confronts a homeless mentally disturbed person, and while he is smashing your tent, asks you, "Oh by the way" why are you here?

And the answer is supposed to make sense?  And the answer might not be "doctored", in good ole snake oil traditon, to support a mean spirited end?

Come on...I mean come on!  Oh, next the Police Chief claimed he "gets a couple emails a week" from fishermen complaining that homeless camps next to the river ruin their fishing, "and they aren't coming back".  Now that might have some reality to it, but based on what...anecdotal evidence?  One of two emails?

Let's be real here.  Redding has a homeless problems like the rest of the United States has a homeless problem. The problem is a product of the greatest gap between rich and poor in the nation's history.  It's the economy!  And it is not simple.  And it will take actions on a national and state wide scale to address.  And it will be expensive.  

I have my own political opinions about what to do, as do my conservative friends.  The oppositional nature of that debate is at gridlock, so nothing is done and the homeless population just keeps on growing.  

Just like the Dust Bowl kept on growing, until it rained, and we figured out how to deal with soil erosion and farming practices that were the real source of the problem.  The solution was found, the Dust Bowl ended, and the snake oil salesmen went away.

I suggest that our current snake oil salesman goes away, and we all get busy fixing the real problem:  Income inequality and yes, income distribution.  Shipping our homeless off to other cities is NOT the solution.

Neither is closing our charitable institutions!   Moreover, who in their right mind thinks the police chief is somehow qualified to deal with the homeless?  This is a social-economic problem, not a criminal one.  To make homeless criminals is not only wrong, but viscious.

Pull back the curtain...who is this guy really????