An unsourced video shows a convoy of five white Waymo Jaguar robot taxis on a freeway (presumably with Google employees in the driver’s seats — Waymo is only authorized at present for driverless trips on Los Angeles’ surface streets, but Google’s Waymo subsidiary has been sending robot taxis onto the freeway for training, with stand-by human drivers).
As a symbol of my dedication to my rapidly increasing number of Substack subscribers, I actually left my closet tonight and drove around to report on rumors of cybernetic white flight from Los Angeles. I drove a few miles up and down broad Venice Boulevard near the 10-405 freeway interchange on the Westside. I’d normally see 10 or 15 robot cars in that timespan (I think they drive up and down Venice Blvd. all night for training and/or advertising because it’s wide and calm).
But none were out tonight.
This is ten to twelve miles west of downtown Los Angeles where several Waymos were burned by rioters. Trump said in reference, “This is why we can’t have nice things.”
So, have they all fled for parts unknown?
Paywall here.
On the other hand, my Waymo app, after warning me of delays due to unspecified reasons, claimed it could have a robot pick me up at UCLA in ten minutes.
So, while Waymo appears to have scaled back its presence for fear of rioters, it seems to still be in operation in Los Angeles to some extent.
Contrary to everybody’s fears/hopes of Los Angeles being burned to the ground, absolutely nothing was going on in the parts of L.A. that I saw.
In general, these protests/riots have so far been pretty small potatoes in terms of turnout: maybe 5,000 people showing up per day out of a vast city of four million, county of ten million, and five-county metro area of 17 million. As I pointed out yesterday, the March 25, 2006 “Gran Marcha” by illegal aliens hoping George W. Bush, Ted Kennedy, and John McCain would bring them amnesty brought at least 500,000 marchers downtown and perhaps as many as 1,500,000.
But, also in contrast to the strikingly well-behaved 2006 throng, a vastly higher percentage of 2025’s smallish mob is destructive. (This is despite not many African Americans participating because they are apathetic at most about the fate of Latino illegals.)
This is all posing a major challenge to the Establishment Media over how to square the circle of claiming that Trump is over-reacting without admitting that The People aren’t turning out in large numbers, but instead just a relative handful of radicals and riot junkies are doing radical riot junkie stuff.
I think one of the lessons of the 21st Century has been that Latinos tend to be less intractable than African Americans in terms of imposing public order. Just make it clear that the authorities are finally serious, and Hispanics fall into line eventually.
In contrast, when the cops retreat to donut shop, as they did after George Floyd kicked the bucket on May 25, 2020, the black murder rate spiked by the end of May and the black traffic fatality rate by mid-June. But the big increases in Hispanic mayhem tended to be in 2021 because it takes longer for Latinos to believe that the white Establishment has gone so far nuts that it doesn’t mind them running amok.
Recall that the giant turnout by 5’4” illegal aliens in 2006 was after the most famous politicians in America, such as the President and the Last Kennedy, made clear they wanted illegals to march in favor of giving them amnesty, which they wanted to do.
Today, Donald Trump is (by far) the most famous politician in America, and he doesn’t want to give illegals amnesty. So most illegals are keeping their heads down in 2025.
In contrast, I suspect the Waymo burner-types tend to be highly Americanized fourth generation Chicano hereditary radicals whose grandpas in 1969 were Brown Berets (the Chicano knock-off of the Black Panthers).
This is a troublesome realization for people on all sides of the political divide. Those on the Left hoping to profit politically from the Great Replacement tend to be frustrated by the timidity of first generation Latin American immigrants, while those on the Right who think that all we have to do is crack down on illegal immigration are likely to be disappointed by the illegals’ more Americanized descendants.
<i>In general, these protests/riots have so far been pretty small potatoes</i>
That's something I figured out way back when, right on the heels of Ferguson.
I had to read even very thoughtful people in our movement insinuate that everything with a 30 mile radius of Ground Zero and the Fergaza Strip was leveled to the ground.
In reality, the rioting and protesting was so localized in terms of its geography that, if I would have never paid attention to the news, I would have never known that the world's biggest news was happening in my own metropolitan area. That's how infrequently I interacted with those parts of the area.
What we have to remember, especially in light of our own sensationalist propensities, is that, while these things fill out a screen on a device, they don't fill out a city.
So I figured it is in L.A. -- I surmised that these things are happening in like 0.001% of Los Angeles city or county geography.
Hats off to the Brown Berets for incorporating home plate in their heraldic device.