The rich lefties tried to buy their way to power and failed (for now)

1. Money can’t buy happiness (or CD-11, apparently)

by Riley Nork

California took days to determine the final results of its primary, on account of elections in this state are operated worse than Third World military dictatorships, but two wealthy self-funded candidates did poorly in their respective races.

Saikat Chakrabati — who took the Bezos approach of gravitating toward a thicc Latina after making his tech money, serving as AOC’s chief of staff — dropped $10 million on his House race.

Meanwhile Tom Steyer, the self-professed billionaire “class traitor,” spent over $200 million on his race for governor. Both candidates landed in third place, and will miss the cut for November’s general election, which serves as a helpful reminder:

While fun to complain about, rich dudes “BuYiNg ElEcTiOnS” is… not so easy in practice! Keep this in mind the next time Saikat’s thicc former boss says Elon’s political donations are ‘literally the end of democracy’ or whatever.

Saikat Chakrabati — who took the Bezos approach of gravitating toward a thicc Latina after making his tech money, serving as AOC’s chief of staff — dropped $10 million on his House race. Carlos Avila Gonzalez/San Francisco Chronicle via AP

Meanwhile Tom Steyer, the self-professed billionaire “class traitor,” spent over $200 million on his race for governor. AP Photo/Noah Berger

2. Put the conspiracies to bed (if you can find one)

by Mike Solana

As media pundits continue to assure us that Nithya Raman’s weeklong leapfrog over Spencer Pratt in the LA mayoral race was totally fraud-free and definitely not more suspicious than a homeless man in Venice leaving the Walgreens with a whiskey-bottle-sized bulge in his jacket, it’s important we blindly trust these pundits and not point out inconvenient facts: like the thousands of voters registered to LA homeless shelters that — whoops! — don’t even have beds.

Per The California Post, several thousand voters had their registrations tied to such shelters, even though many currently offer zero accommodations whatsoever.

And would you look at that! One such accommodation-free “shelter” even got a $600,000 grant delivered by COUNCILWOMAN NITHYA RAMAN HERSELF while she chaired a homelessness committee. To be fair, it’s entirely possible this wasn’t a de facto bribe… perhaps the homeless tweakers just loved her policy platform (she lets them camp outside schools, after all).

3. “Oh my mama, they got drones.”

by Max Weiner

In a viral clip that resurfaced this week, San Francisco felon turned rapper Dreamlife Rizzy tells rap tastemaker and pornstar connoisseur Adam22 that “crime in San Francisco is over with,” because Flock Safety’s license plate readers and drones have made his fav pastime, drive-bys in stolen cars, impossible.

Responding Monday, Flock CSO Rahul Sidhu said, “when the risk of getting caught is too high, crime plummets.”

He’s right: In Oakland and Berkeley, auto thefts have dropped 57% since implementing Flock in 2023.

Naturally, activists are furious. Leading the opposition is Will Freeman, a software engineer who founded DeFlock, a website mapping cameras and arming activists with city council talking points.

Will, from the lawless wasteland known as Boulder, Colorado, with a violent crime rate 28 times lower than Oakland, says this technology is dangerous, and doesn’t work, but even if it did, we need more time to study it. Thank you, Will. Now give me your car.