Los Angeles is in near chaos because of one issue: homelessness.

It’s an issue the media has largely ignored. Part of the reason is the mainstream media, largely, believes the economy is hunky-dory under President Obama and California’s Democratic regime.

The U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest said Clinton’s plan would cost $403 billion over the refugees’ lifetimes.

But the residents and even the liberal-leaning Los Angeles Times know better.

On Thursday, the LA Times threw up a red flag, begging voters for help in an editorial. The reason is because the city is overrun with the homeless, who sleep in cardboard boxes (if that), push around carts of their possessions, and use the streets and sidewalks as toilets.

The Times said as many as 28,000 homeless live in the city. A total of 47,000 homeless live in Los Angeles County. The county endured a 12 percent increase in homelessness from 2013 to 2015.

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Now the Times wants more of what Obama and Gov. Jerry Brown, the Democrat, has already given them: more spending.

The Times wants Los Angeles voters to approve Proposition HHH, which would authorize $1.2 billion in general obligation bonds paid for by property taxes. The plan is to build 10,000 housing units within 10 years.

Even if this is a good step to cut down on homelessness — it likely is not, given the role of mental illness and substance abuse in homelessness — it points out the folly of allowing more Syrian refugees and illegal immigrants into the nation. City, county, and state budgets are stressed to the breaking point.

And the federal government has added about $9 trillion in debt just under Obama.

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The homeless may have substance abuse problems. They may have mental illness. Others may simply have no money. But the vast majority of them are likely U.S. citizens or legal residents. They deserve first priority from the states to get whatever money is budgeted for poor relief.

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The White House and Hillary Clinton have prioritized a space for Syrian refugees in the United States. It’s not that these refugees don’t deserve help. But refugee programs tend to be expensive solutions, while doing nothing to solve the causes of Syrian strife.

Obama wanted to get at least get 10,000 settled into the United States by Sept. 30. He surpassed that goal. He wants to add as many as another 90,000 refugees before he leaves office.

Clinton wants to resettle another 65,000 refugees from Syria. The U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest said Clinton’s plan would cost $403 billion over a life span the refugees.

According to estimates from the Center for Immigration Studies, the cost per 10,000 refugees is $6.5 billion over the refugees’ lifetime.

When resettled, the refugees may get benefits that the U.S. homeless often struggle to get — especially if the homeless lack identification, which many homeless do not use or have. Refugees could potentially get Social Security’s Supplemental Security Income, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, food stamps, and more.

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They would qualify for other benefits so long as they possess green cards.

As for illegal immigrants, a 2013 report by the Federation of American Immigration Reform estimated the annual costs of illegal immigration at the federal, state, and local level to be about $113 billion.

Meanwhile, the homeless problem is not confined to Los Angeles or other big cities. The National Alliance to End Homelessness says that as of January 2015, as many as 565,000 people were homeless on a given night in the United States.

The problem is growing everywhere, even in affluent areas of San Francisco that have seen expensive townhouses scoop up areas the homeless used to sleep in.

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The problems are unsanitary and often uniquely vexing. In San Francisco in August 2015, columnist Debra Saunders of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote of the bizarre problems that homelessness was having: “How bad is the urine situation in San Francisco? This is not a joke: Monday night, a light pole corroded by urine collapsed and crashed onto a car, narrowly missing the driver. The smell is worse than I have known since I started working for the Chronicle in 1992.”

Saunders also noted that “enterprising street people had hooked into electricity — there were dozens of cords plugged into power strips.” Those power costs get passed onto residences and businesses.

One solution, Saunders noted, is a “navigation center” to send homeless who are cited for violations to the right social service agencies.

But another problem is drugs. As Obama boasts of taking more drug offenders out of prison, many of them head to sleep on the streets while they abuse drugs anew. It’s a side effect of the rush to unlock drug offenders, even though not all drug offenders go to the street.

The problems are deep — though not impossible to solve. But if the nation and states must also pay for more refugees and illegal immigrants, the homeless can expect their problems to go unnoticed.