Forget It Jake, It's Los Angeles

DJ Waldie gets a little nihilistic in an essay called "The Foster City," in which he details the LA institutions that have been screwed up by outsiders (the Dodgers, the Times) and the insiders that have screwed up LA institutions so bad that they had to be overseen by outsiders (the Sheriff's Department, Metro, LAUSD, LAPD): "Few of us want to see Los Angeles as it is or what it should be; we’ve let others do it for us. This city’s unaccountable political structure, its conception of power merely as the means to another deal, and the city’s air of disconnected neutrality have let thugs police its streets, unfeeling technocrats run its services, and the McCourts loot its most-loved institution. And when those faults became intolerable, others – not us – imposed their solutions. We’ve come to expect this – and worse – from Los Angeles and ourselves. 'Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown.' might as well be the motto on the city seal." [Zocalo Public Square, via LAObserved]