New York Times Column Says Oil, Gas Companies Should Pay For LA Fires
The New York Times has officially lost it.
A new opinion column published on the Times' website is trying to blame oil and gas companies for the catastrophic fires that destroyed several huge parts of Los Angeles. And no surprise, the writer, David Jones, is the "director of the Climate Risk Initiative" at UC Berkeley.
Jones in his article claims that the fires were "driven by climate change," a completely unproven, inaccurate excuse for the mismanagement of far-left California and Los Angeles political leadership.
"While much of the ire over the devastating fires is aimed at elected officials, there has been little attention given to the coal, oil and gas companies that have contributed substantially to the conditions fueling this and other climate disasters," Jones writes.
It's hard to comprehend how utterly disconnected from reality this statement is; a complete abandonment of objective truth. Climate change did not cause the LA fires, even as more and more individuals are arrested on suspicion of arson in the LA area, nor did it exacerbate them. High-strength Santa Ana winds are common in LA. What isn't common is having entire cities destroyed because the fire department ran out of water thanks to empty reservoirs. Jones knows this, but his ideology is so consumed with nonsensical ravings about climate change, he simply can't accept his political party was wrong.
And he wasn't done there.
LOS ANGELES - Flames from the Palisades Fire burn a building on Sunset Boulevard amid a powerful windstorm on January 8, 2025 in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Apu Gomes/Getty Images)
LA Fires Were Predictable Consequence Of Incompetence, Not Climate Change
Jones says that "oil and gas companies" are knowingly causing climate change, and as such should be forced to pay for disasters, not insurance.
"States, cities and regulators urgently need to hold the oil and gas industry accountable for the devastation that fossil fuels cause," he says.
This is, of course, nonsense. It's not the responsibility of oil and gas companies to clear brush, use controlled burns, or refill water reservoirs. That's what the government in California is supposed to handle. Instead, it wasted billions providing free healthcare to illegal aliens while cutting fire management budgets.
But progressive leadership finds it much easier to cast blame on other parties instead of taking responsibility for its own failures.
"For decades, oil and gas companies have been allowed to mislead the public and profit from their products while sticking others with the bill for climate change," is the remarkably insane conclusion of an insane article.
Jones and the Times are the ones "misleading the public" and "profiting" from the sale of climate change alarmism and extremism. Government funding, jobs, billions in grants are handed out based on nonsense like this. It's inexcusable and offensive to the people suffering from a disaster that was preventable.