Taxpaying Angelenos write big checks every year. They dump billions into homelessness services –– and the tents, needles and suffering still turn neighborhoods into obstacle courses.

Then Mayor Karen Bass drops her latest pearl of wisdom: Homeless folks use meth “to stay awake for protection on the city’s dangerous streets.”

Bless her heart.

This isn’t compassionate; it’s Olympic-level mental gymnastics that insults every working stiff paying the tab while watching their city circle the drain. 

It perfectly explains why Bass’s approval hovers in the 32%–36% range, with disapproval in the 57%–66% zone in recent polls.

Let’s be real about how ludicrous her statement is. 

LA’s streets are dangerous because of the unchecked addiction, open-air drug markets, and policies that treat hard drugs like optional accessories. 

Meth isn’t some clever night-watchman hack –– it’s a brain-melting chemical that delivers psychosis, paranoia, rotting teeth and the exact chaos that makes sidewalks unlivable.

Bass reframes it as a rational survival tool, as if the real villain is insufficient empathy instead of the self-inflicted cycle her approach enables.

We’ve seen the numbers: Hyper-pure meth drives chronic homelessness, trapping people in sleepless, tormented states that kill any shot at recovery.

Calling it “protection” doesn’t help users; it just gives policymakers cover to keep funding the same failing system.

Look at Inside Safe program: Thousands moved indoors at taxpayer expense, yet roughly 40% bounced right back to the streets.

Bass’s tone-deaf moment fits the broader pattern that’s tanked her popularity. 

Polls show that Angelenos are fed up with homelessness theater despite the eye-watering spending. Unsheltered counts dropped 17.5% over two years (per Bass’s favorite stat) but overall numbers are still higher than pre-pandemic. 

Rough sleeping is up in spots, and encampments remain a daily eyesore.

Taxpayers notice the gap: mountains of cash, modest paper wins, persistent misery.

When your top concern is still tents, drugs and trash, hearing the mayor explain meth as self-defense sounds less like insight and more like excuse making. 

No wonder 67% say the city is on the “wrong track.”

Combined with the Palisades and Eaton fires and a near-billion-dollar budget deficit, you’ve got a masterclass in how not to win over voters who just want basic competence.

Working families scrape by with sky-high rents while the city subsidizes endless interim housing with iffy results. Residents live with smash-and-grabs, theft and disorder that make everyday life feel precarious.

Bass reluctance to lean harder on enforcement only reinforces the sense that ideology matters more than outcomes. 

We aren’t heartless. Real help for people in crisis is worth pursuing. 

But excusing meth as an anti-sleep stimulant and “protection” signals surrender: City Hall will manage symptoms forever instead of demanding sobriety, accountability and safer streets.

It’s the same compassionate progressivism that turned Skid Row into a spectacle and left us with visible decay amid record spending.

Bass’s deep unpopularity isn’t a mystery. It’s the bill coming due for years of talk over actual results.

Taxpayers are tired of paying premium prices for excuses.

Richie Greenberg is a political commentator based in San Francisco.

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