Politicians in red states such as Louisiana do a lot of stupid stuff, like politicians in California do. When a hurricane sweeps through the South, does that make politicians from California threaten to withhold much-needed aid to American citizens in peril? It does not. And yet after Altadena and the Palisades are devastated by fires in one of the worst natural disasters in our country’s history, somehow a grandstanding pol such as the speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, R-Louisiana, can say that federal aid should be conditional: “It appears to us that state and local leaders were derelict in their duty in many respects. So that’s something that has to be factored in,” Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Alabama, says of  the idea of outside aid for our state: “They don’t deserve anything, to be honest with you.” Knowing zilch about the California landscape, of the way we live here, of the drought-fueled blazes that have literally zero to do with our state’s water policies or delta smelt or “poor forest management,” he claims we got incinerated because of “inner-city woke policies.” This, from the until recently Auburn football coach who once in office voted to overturn the legitimate election of a president and for 10 months blocked promotion of all senior officers in the military because of Defense Department policies allowing service members the right to an abortion. There’s no “forest” in the San Gabriel Mountains or the Malibu hills that would have benefited from logging blocked by tree-huggers or any such nonsense. There is dense chaparral that grew denser after two winters of intense rain and that now is bone-dry after no rain since last May. As fire experts who unlike distant politicians actually know what caused the destruction say, it’s not the ignition — it’s the parched fuel, and the almost unprecedented wintertime 90 mph Santa Ana winds that drove the fires once they were started, that brought us down. And then there’s Donald Trump, whose fire response was also to threaten to deny California aid, going into his usual MO of just making stuff up to punish a state that didn’t vote for him: “Governor Gavin Newscum refused to sign the water restoration declaration put before him that would have allowed millions of gallons of water, from excess rain and snow melt from the North, to flow daily into many parts of California, including the areas that are currently burning in a virtually apocalyptic way,” Trump wrote on social media. This is a lie from the man who will be president on Monday. State water policies had nothing to do with my hometown of Altadena being destroyed last week. There is plenty of water in Altadena’s pipes. And yet no amount of water, and no amount of Los Angeles County firefighter staffing, could have stopped the millions of blazing embers that blew down on the town from the ridges above Eaton Canyon in a — yes, hurricane-force — wind from landing on the roofs of thousands of homes and businesses within a couple hours and destroying them. Related Articles Opinion Columnists | Susan Shelley: Biden can’t leave fast enough. His presidency has been a total failure. Opinion Columnists | Matt Fleming: Wildfires unleash an endless stream of very bad takes Opinion Columnists | Jon Coupal: Information and resources for taxpayers impacted by the LA wildfires Opinion Columnists | Wildfires incinerate Newsom’s already flimsy budget proposal Opinion Columnists | Biden should resist the temptation to pardon his allies. It would set a terrible precedent. Apparently never having been here, and therefore blaming the fires on the imaginary lack of logging in the Angeles National Forest, which looks a bit different than national forests in his home state of Wisconsin do, Sen. Ron Johnson says he won’t support aid to California because of the “moral hazard” of living where we do. Idiotically, he compares his state to ours: “We’re not really subject to these types of dangers. And we actually do conduct forestry and we try and manage our forests as best as possible.” So do we, senator, up north where the trees grow tall. But down south we are rather a drier place than Wisconsin. We don’t border Lake Michigan and Lake Superior, or have 15,000 other smaller freshwater lakes and ponds. Pulling back from the foolishness of ignorant politicians, given the Santa Anas, given the deluge-and-drought rain years, given that, yes, from Paradise to Altadena to the Palisades we have created neighborhoods and whole cities in California on the edge of wilderness and thus in grave danger from fire, this all does beg an existential question: Should we rebuild? Should we still live where we do? Once the shock and grief subside a little, we will have to answer. Larry Wilson is on the Southern California News Group editorial board. [email protected].