My sincerest apologies. This post has absolutely nothing to do with travel unless you consider it a trip in time, a trip designed to right wrongs and to bring truth and justice back to journalism.
I was born and raised in San Bernardino, California, a city that was recently libeled and maligned by the hacks at Business Insider.
That yellow rag had the temerity to rank San Bernardino as the 42nd Most Miserable City in America.
This is clearly complete nonsense and I demand that Business Insider immediately issue a retraction and correction. As anyone who has ever lived in the Inland Empire can attest, or as anyone who has feared for their life as they’ve driven through town as fast as possible without slowing down will willingly swear, there couldn’t possibly be forty-one cities in America more miserable than this horrid burg.
Far from being the forty-second most miserable city in America, it is clearly number one.
Here’s how Business Insider mischaracterized the situation:
In compiling its rankings, Business Insider said it used U.S. Census information to analyze 1,000 U.S. cities on metrics such as crime, drug addiction, population changes, job opportunities, commute times, household incomes, abandoned homes and effects from problems such as natural disasters…
The 10 California cities and their rankings were: Bell Gardens (14); Compton (41); El Monte (22); Hemet (44); Huntington Park (10); Lancaster (50); Lynwood (21); Montebello (40); Palmdale; and San Bernardino (42).
I lived in the San Bernardino area for the first twenty-one years of my life, and I still own property there. I believe that gives me special standing to tell you that Business Insider’s rankings are vile propaganda of the very worst sort. It is complete farce. It is, as they say, fake news. I do not believe it for a minute. I know in my heart that there is no way those other cities are worse than San Bernardino.
Have any of those other cities suffered through one of the largest municipal bankruptcies in American history? In a word, no.
Do any of those other cities have thicker smog to hide their horizons and poison their progeny? Highly unlikely.
Do any of those other cities have violent crime rates higher than San Bernardino’s? I doubt it.
Do any of those other cities have more corrupt politicians now serving time in state and federal penitentiaries? Who do you think you’re kidding?
Are the streets of any of those other cities flooded with more methamphetimines than San Bernardino’s? Populated by more street gangs per capita? Have they suffered through more fatal terrorist attacks? Are they overwhelmed by more illegal aliens? Don’t make me laugh.
In view of these facts, I’m sure you will agree with me that Business Insider’s rankings are a complete misrepresentation of the facts. And I call for all San Bernardinians to take a stand.
Please join with me to demand that Business Insider immediately retract and correct the vicious lie that San Bernardino is America’s 42nd Most Miserable City.
We must vow — each and every one of us — not to rest until we are able to join together in a city-wide chant that echoes across the Inland Empire:
“We’re number one. We’re number one. We’re number one.”