Fascists harass car dwellers

The government needs to get its hairy ass screwed on straight.

With more and more Americans being forced to live out of their cars as a result of the "new economy" and greedy, foreclosure-happy banks, what does the government do as a result?

Does it limit banks' foreclosure efforts? In most areas, no. That would make too much sense.

Does it require builders of new subdivisions to set aside a certain percentage of homes for low-income households? In most places, nope! That's because Freeper types have cried that this is un-American commieism. (The Freeper terrorists think "freedom" means outlawing labor unions.)

So what does the government do? Oh, it punishes the people who have to live in their cars, of course.

In Los Angeles, City Clowncil passed an ordinance this year on overnight parking, which was designed to punish the car-bound. In fact it's illegal (not just in L.A. but reportedly throughout the state of California) for people to live in their cars (even if they have no other choice).

Other cities are even more unbending in punishing folks who live in cars or RV's. Some cities even confiscate their cars without a trial (which is unconstitutional).

Extremists think this still isn't enough, and they're lobbying to have the disadvantaged punished even further - despite the fact that their proposals run afoul of state regulations requiring accommodations for others who use local waterways.

It gets worse.

Folks who are forced to live in their cars have increasingly found themselves verbally harassed by wealthy locals.

I'm sorry, but there's no excuse whatsoever for this conduct (especially from so-called adults). It's terroristic threatening, and it's a classist hate crime. Police, prosecutors, and judges need to throw the book at the harassers, and lawmakers need to pass much stiffer laws against them.

If right-wing mayors didn't squander all their resources figuring out ways to implement school uniforms and bellyaching about the "social promotion" hoax, there might be more scrutiny of this outrage. If right-wing city governments spent half as much effort in combating the housing shortage as they do trying to eliminate small apartments in an effort to drive out poor people, people might not have to live in cars in the first place.

In other words, they have no business punishing the poor for living in cars, because it's often the city's fault they have to live in cars.

(Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080623/ap_on_re_us/mobile_homeless)