Soros and Garza have blood on their hands, just as Biden, Bragg, and Mayorkas do with Laken Riley. However, Voters need to take responsibility. If they continue to back far left DSA candidates, then they will reap the crime and deterioration that they sow.
If Garza is said to easily win the election, then people who vote for him deserve the hell they are living in. You can’t have it both ways. If our electorate still doesn’t understand it, then there is no hope.
The Austin situation is far more than that though. There is a core group that epitomize the worst of the woke of ideology. Luxury belief holders on steroids. I know many personally.
Half of our country is in that state. How is mass media an excuse? We are talking about responsible mature adults of voting age. Even kids should be learning to think independently. But adults - if they are not capable of critical thinking, then we will be living in a third or fourth world country soon. Or a communist state like NK.
At this point, they do deserve it, but everyone else doesn't. The children who get shot don't deserve it. And the people who get mugged or the cleaned out stores. The rest of society is collateral damage. The thousands of people who live in Connecticut and Long Island and New Jersey who no longer go into a city they love because of a corrupt Manhattan DA and a corrupt state DA and a completely unresponsive legislature, don't deserve it.
Of course. I said in my post people who vote for him deserve it. You cannot vote for a progressive SJW who defies rule of law and expect a safe and lawful environment. It is the entire country that is becoming a collateral damage to their dangerous ideology.
I was just elaborating. Everyone pays the price. Since so much - culture, doctors, business, finance, is riding on cities, maybe state voters should vote on governance.
The only thing that helped Austin under the prior mayor was that the governor did exactly that. Cleared the homeless from state highways. Ordered state troopers to patrol those highways and respond to 911 calls. I kid you not that in response the city council complained that the troopers were having too much contact with persons of color. Because the neighborhoods where they live is where most of the 911 calls originated.
I don't and have never lived in Texas, but I would think that all the affluent tech company people moving into the city in recent years along with the refugees from blue states would have moderated the politics a bit as far as the elected officials. Austin has become extraordinarily wealthy, as compared with a place like say, Portland or Oakland or Baltimore.
Soros is the human equivalent of the neutron bomb - kill the people but keep the infrastructure. From open borders, to $millions sent to fund “election night workers”, to DEI, to funding DAs who believe the criminals are the victims, and politicians that believe that the Constitution and America are innately evil. We’ve now reached an inflection point. The open question is whether we have the strength and resolve to reverse this descent into Third World status. We’ll see.
They haven’t talked to people in greater Houston much. A lot of Austin’s demoralized population are due to the massive run up in housing costs and the huge influx of people moving into Austin thinking the city is the same as it was in the 70’s and 80’s. The musicians have moved out of the county or to the hill near Willys ranch. There are to many people crammed into a small area and the traffic is terrible, some of the worst in the country. Austin has been number one in the nation for the number of commuters coming in from across the county line. Very little has been done to address this except the usual put down more lanes, by the time they finished just the mopac expansion it was overburden the day the extra lanes opened. It’s just not a “cool” city anymore.
The Cali and tech refugees are driving much of that uptick in housing too. The DIE types with their luxury beliefs forcing people of modest means who have lived there for generations. And there is no escape to "near Willys ranch" . The average cost of a house in Dripping Springs is the highest in Hays County - pushing $600,000.
Chicago has unfortunately become a victim of this same mentality. First Lori, now Brandon, just a home grown lab rat raised by the CTU to do their bidding. Constant carjackings and forget about going into the downtown on a weekend night unless you relish the idea of getting caught up in a teen mob rioting or shooting. It’s too bad, as it really is a great city.
Comments like, "It's not a Democrat or a Republican issue" only come up when the Democrats are in the line of fire. Whenever Republicans are in charge, it is a full-throated attack. When Democrats are ruining things, then we need to look for "nuance"...
It won't matter which Democrat stooge the people of Austin choose. By choosing Democrats, they are choosing to turn Austin into another liberal shithole...
Well it does create a conundrum though. Because many of the Democrat voters in the area are indoctrinated to Vote Blue No Matter Who. They don't know or care to know anything other than blue good, red bad. So what to do with two blues? Oh me, oh my. The consternation.
There will be tears. The ones capable of understanding what incumbent means will likely vote against Garza. (FWIW I am not referring to the working class but to the brain dead youth.) The former long-serving mayor, Adler, is IMO responsible for much of what ails Austin as he attracted like flies to poop people like Cesar and Garza. But in last election Austin elected a moderate, experienced mayor. A Democrat but far more centrist than the last one.
This is a result of the long term PRA policies (People's Republic of Austin). Now, they are not sure how to deal with it. Lots of pearl grabbing. But, they deserve what they get. A useless public defender with a second class law degree. Demoralized police force. Where have we seen this?
Question, How Active is the Texas GOP in Austin? I ask because here in MPLS there is No active GOP Party, or conservative movement. The voters here really have no choice. Oh they'll run some candidates, but no money no support. I believe this is true in many cities.
1) Crime statistics are murky now. I have seen it here in Philly. In areas where crime has become the norm many crimes go unreported. When citizens know the criminal is likely to be back on the street in their neighborhood, any crime below murder is sometimes unreported. The Austin DA touting a “drop” in crime is likely a drop in reported crime.
2) Isn’t it ironic that safe streets and other ideas like an organized border, functioning and merit based schools, a powerful and judiciously deployed military and controlled government spending are things the Democrats are “returning” to? I have been told for almost a decade that Rs have moved to the extreme right and the D’s are moderate. But if the D’s are “returning” to common sense, maybe they are the ones who moved to the extreme. Trump’s and R policies look a lot like Truman’s, JFK’s and Bill Clinton’s. Yes, Trumpian rhetoric is harsher but perhaps it needs to be to get through what has become a politicized media.
At least in the very large, blue city where I live, measured crime rates went up for two years after the BLM riots and have since dropped from the peak. The reason is that the police chief has deployed the remaining cops (those who didn’t retire or quit to take safer jobs in the suburbs) to the hood to stem the tide of violent crime in those hotspots. Which has been partly successful in those particular areas.
The result is that the rest of the city is nearly unpoliced, and the formerly low and medium crime areas are experiencing something akin to rising anarchy. There are no consequences for crime and even formerly law abiding people take that as an opportunity to simply disregard the law. One manifestation is that you never see any traffic enforcement because it’s a low priority and driving has become dangerous as people run red lights, weave through traffic at high speeds, and even drive on the wrong side of the street as I recently observed. Everyone is becoming more aggressive in their frustration.
So violent crime stats don’t tell the whole story, it’s more complicated, and the quality of life has definitely deteriorated.
Here in Philly I have seen the same thing with city traffic. It's made even worse because there seems to be a corresponding aggressiveness among pedestrians. Drivers are emboldened by lack of enforcement and pedestrians are emboldened because they see the vehicle as the enemy to be challenged by cross the street slowly and ignoring common sense safety.
In Chicago, an attempt to improve crime response with technology is now headed for the scrap heap. ShotSpotter is a system of synchronized microphones that can instantly triangulate the location of a gunshot. But the progressive view is that it results in over-policing, whatever that means, so it must go. Luxury beliefs held by those unaffected by the stray bullets flying in poorer neighborhoods now drive worsening crime clearance rates. The Mayor promised the system would be dismantled.
Actually, the progressive view is that it hears way too many shots in black neighborhoods. That goes against the narrative, and therefore it must be dismantled.
The Dems have created their own statistics by refusing to charge people with crimes.
They've also started labeling every arrested person "white." I found that hard to believe until I looked at the actual websites instead of the screenshots. It's a very simple method of altering statistics to suit their ideological and political goals.
Like the author, I also lived in Austin during the 1980s, earning two degrees from UT, performing poetry and music all over town, and as a merchandiser for 2 years for Shiner of Austin. Ironically I am headed there today for a doctor’s appointment and have many friends still living there. Two things I can note is that long time “old school” residents blame much of the decline and change on the newcomers, particularly the Californians. And the current homeless have an aggressive desperate edge the old “drag worms” never had. Back in the day Austin was a live and let live town, with hippies, punk rockers, cosmic and authentic cowboys, government employees, and college students living a cheap great harmonious existence. Nowadays Austin has acquired the big city problems of urban blight, income disparity, terrible traffic and, yes, crime unknown in most of Texas, where acting out of line used to be quickly, harshly and largely self policed by the Texan attitude. It’s sad, really, but it seems all the folks pouring in come looking for a legendary laid back lifestyle they are helping to destroy.
The reality is that people who are fleeing problems generally end up bringing those problems along with them. This is true in people's personal lives as well as in population masses. Change can only come from within, not by changing the venue.
Not just cities with progressive DAs. I think you’d be hard pressed to find a city that hasn’t gotten worse with respect to crime, filth, taxes and general malaise.
But it's the city voters who put these people in office. Radical leftists cannot govern -- the cities are falling apart, and the voters still elect them.
It's demographics and sociology. The balancing middle class - the middle of all races has left the city --priced and taxed out, schools, crime, and more crime --has left city elections to large numbers of poor, many also migrants, who will vote for redistribution, and, it appears, anti- white rhetoric. Look at New York's anti- law enforcement, anti- white, anti- American, anti-voter integrity- it voted to give non- citizens the vote and was rebuffed by the courts -- anti- capitalist city council. These things used to be called sedition. The council reflects the electorate. Absolutely, there are some who don't feel that way, but they are out-numbered by the above and by rich, progressive elites. And let's not forget the drmographic/generational change and voting patterns after decades of indoctrination.
You're seeing what happens without the social glue of the " bourgeois" middle class, when it doesn't hold. Or, as in the cases of Seattle and Portland, the far left takes over. I think people are intimidated from addressing the demographics of crime and decline. And we stand by and watch our cities become dystopian sink holes.
I still call it sedition. But in Austin it is the poorer people forced out. There is no rent control there, rents are through the roof and the people who own houses that have been in their families for generations can no longer afford the taxes.
Sedition- conduct "amounting to insurrection; conduct tending to treason, but without an overt act; excitement of discontent against the government, or of resistance to lawful authority."
Let’s see what happens. I agree things are looking slightly better but Democrats have been doing a horrible job for quite a while and are masters of projection. It seems to me what and who are screwing up has been obvious for a long time. Now Democrats elites are being affected, which they seemed perfectly happy when others have to deal with it, now it’s a crisis!
Why do so many billionaires like Lubetzky choose to be progressive/liberal and vote, lobby and donate to causes aimed directly at destroying the country and system that allowed them to achieve great success? From the safety of their walled-off opulent claves protected by armed security, they decry inequality yet are unwilling to live a modest lifestyle similar to that of the unwashed masses. Why would you not protect and promote the system that facilitated their success so that others have a chance to also succeed? Perhaps they're insecure that if others succeed it will threaten to dilute their standing among the elite.
I don’t understand the guilt thing that some of the very wealthy have. Then to assuage that guilt by virtue signaling as a progressive or even a Marxist is dishonest in my view. I don’t see any of the guilt-ridden forfeiting their wealth and lifestyle. Start a charity, scholarship fund, mentorship academies…anything that will foster productivity and motivation in poor communities. Just don’t try to destroy the very thing, this country and market system, that allows one to become wealthy.
I believe the writer Rob Henderson (who was recently featured in FP) sums it up with the phrase "luxury beliefs." I used to live in Fairfield County, Connecticut, a very affluent area that is now largely Dem. The progressive left's fave policies (green investment, LGBTQ anything, and more of the same blah blah) play well there because, well, they're fashionable policies and those in that county (and much of the rest of the state) are, if nothing else, fashionable. But lately their greedy side is on display everywhere in Connecticut as they vote down proposal after proposal that would bring affordable housing to their towns. (In Connecticut, towns rule - there are no county governments so there is none of the equalizing impact of, say, countywide school systems which are the norm in places such as Maryland and, where I grew up, in Florida.) Their motto could be "no Levittowns in my town!" Even though, working class suburbs such as Levittown (there were actually three) were actually the biggest contribution to post-WWII upward mobility that ever happened.
I sometimes think it is like burning the bridge behind them. They were able to get wild success...but KEEPING that success is difficult if the system still allows hard working people with good ideas to possibly surpass you. So, once you are in power, you change the rules so other people can't climb up to your level.
That they ever left it, while imposing authoritarian thought crimes on those who dared contradict the utterly idiotic, low IQ idea of "defunding the police" and no longer prosecuting certain crimes ought to mean, to anyone with half a brain (sadly, there aren't many) should wipe the Dems off the map for all of us. Unfortunately, I have recently engaged with Democrat voters who DENY CRIME EXISTS AT ALL...DENY THE DEMOGRAPHICS MOST RESPONSIBLE FOR IT....
NEVER FORGET THE HARM THAT THE DEMOCRAT PROGRESSIVES HAVE DONE TO US ALL.
I am not sure it matters. Once the electorate realizes (as Ben Franklin so astutely warned) that they can vote for the government to give them money, the whole system becomes corrupt. The rich and powerful have been engaging in regulatory capture for over a century.
In Franklin's day you had to have a vested interest in the form of owning property before being eligible to cast a vote. If you're a parasite you don't get a say.
Come now. Renters aren't "parasites." All over New York City are hardworking middle- and working-class people who rent apartments.
While I understand our Founding Fathers' idea that you need some skin in the game to vote, in fact today there are plenty of Americans who own homes, or own even several or more homes, whom you would prefer not to have a say in the running of our country.
Summary: Modern Democrats are locusts. Which is why no normal people anywhere in normal America like to see the the new refugee neighbors turn up with a rainbow flag and an "In this house we believe" yard sign.
"In this house we believe that if you have to tell your neighbors what you believe with a sign in your front yard, then your beliefs are probably trivial phrases that can be summed up in yard signs..."
Hearing the stories of the (true) victims, boils my blood. Of course the stats show improvement.......like most progressive cities, people either aren't reporting the crime because they know nothing will happen or the perpetrator is getting off without any punishment. I can say I lose weight everyday if I never weigh myself!
Maybe more Austin residents need to take advantage of Texas' permit-free open carry law, but then, Garza would probably throw the book at them should an incident occur.
This is why these DAs have been such a focus for people like Soros. They realized they don't have to change laws...which is difficult, if you control the people who prosecute those laws.
He would. For awhile the only prosecutions you could count on from him were of law enforcement officers. The Austin PD is completely demoralized. A new class of cadets did not graduate from.the academy for over two years while the curriculum was adjusted. Meanwhile ever officer with seniority who could get out did. So now APD is largely staffed with very inexperienced officers, including cadets trained in woke ideology. And that 500 number is low from what I hear.
It is. So glad that Abbott brought in the DPS to help patrol. Yet the idiots on the city council whined about the great job they did. Unfortunately the axiom is true: You can’t fix stupid.
Soros and Garza have blood on their hands, just as Biden, Bragg, and Mayorkas do with Laken Riley. However, Voters need to take responsibility. If they continue to back far left DSA candidates, then they will reap the crime and deterioration that they sow.
Austin is the most demoralized city in Texas: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-texas-two-step-part-2
If Garza is said to easily win the election, then people who vote for him deserve the hell they are living in. You can’t have it both ways. If our electorate still doesn’t understand it, then there is no hope.
Most are easily duped by a one-sided media campaign.
The Austin situation is far more than that though. There is a core group that epitomize the worst of the woke of ideology. Luxury belief holders on steroids. I know many personally.
As do I. Many very nice people on my street - neighbors- just west of downtown. I’m amazed at the illogical stance they take. Garza is simply evil.
Half of our country is in that state. How is mass media an excuse? We are talking about responsible mature adults of voting age. Even kids should be learning to think independently. But adults - if they are not capable of critical thinking, then we will be living in a third or fourth world country soon. Or a communist state like NK.
"We are talking about responsible mature adults of voting age. "
In these Marxist areas, most adults are neither responsible nor mature.
At this point, they do deserve it, but everyone else doesn't. The children who get shot don't deserve it. And the people who get mugged or the cleaned out stores. The rest of society is collateral damage. The thousands of people who live in Connecticut and Long Island and New Jersey who no longer go into a city they love because of a corrupt Manhattan DA and a corrupt state DA and a completely unresponsive legislature, don't deserve it.
I'm in NJ. I don't deserve the leftist government I have at all levels - I certainly didn't vote for it - but a majority did.
In a way, I CAN say I deserve it though, because so far I have chosen to stay here.
Murphy tribalized the government. Again, that's because the electorate has changed.
Of course. I said in my post people who vote for him deserve it. You cannot vote for a progressive SJW who defies rule of law and expect a safe and lawful environment. It is the entire country that is becoming a collateral damage to their dangerous ideology.
I was just elaborating. Everyone pays the price. Since so much - culture, doctors, business, finance, is riding on cities, maybe state voters should vote on governance.
The only thing that helped Austin under the prior mayor was that the governor did exactly that. Cleared the homeless from state highways. Ordered state troopers to patrol those highways and respond to 911 calls. I kid you not that in response the city council complained that the troopers were having too much contact with persons of color. Because the neighborhoods where they live is where most of the 911 calls originated.
That is great the state had the authority. Clearly the state or feds have to step in. The council's response is lunacy, and will never change.
I don't and have never lived in Texas, but I would think that all the affluent tech company people moving into the city in recent years along with the refugees from blue states would have moderated the politics a bit as far as the elected officials. Austin has become extraordinarily wealthy, as compared with a place like say, Portland or Oakland or Baltimore.
Neither do Brooklynites who for too long, given our gerrymandered districts, have no one to vote for.
Soros is the human equivalent of the neutron bomb - kill the people but keep the infrastructure. From open borders, to $millions sent to fund “election night workers”, to DEI, to funding DAs who believe the criminals are the victims, and politicians that believe that the Constitution and America are innately evil. We’ve now reached an inflection point. The open question is whether we have the strength and resolve to reverse this descent into Third World status. We’ll see.
I hear there is a new one now. Guy named Wyess or something like that. Old white guy from overseas, lives in Montana or Wyoming.
They haven’t talked to people in greater Houston much. A lot of Austin’s demoralized population are due to the massive run up in housing costs and the huge influx of people moving into Austin thinking the city is the same as it was in the 70’s and 80’s. The musicians have moved out of the county or to the hill near Willys ranch. There are to many people crammed into a small area and the traffic is terrible, some of the worst in the country. Austin has been number one in the nation for the number of commuters coming in from across the county line. Very little has been done to address this except the usual put down more lanes, by the time they finished just the mopac expansion it was overburden the day the extra lanes opened. It’s just not a “cool” city anymore.
The Cali and tech refugees are driving much of that uptick in housing too. The DIE types with their luxury beliefs forcing people of modest means who have lived there for generations. And there is no escape to "near Willys ranch" . The average cost of a house in Dripping Springs is the highest in Hays County - pushing $600,000.
absolutely! Worse traffic than LA or NYC!
Yes it is. The poster city for the argument to eliminate leftism.
I think the poster city must be Chicago. It is difficult to imagine Austin is worse.
Portland, Seattle, Minneapolis, Baltimore and St. Louis all enter the chat.
New York
Chicago has unfortunately become a victim of this same mentality. First Lori, now Brandon, just a home grown lab rat raised by the CTU to do their bidding. Constant carjackings and forget about going into the downtown on a weekend night unless you relish the idea of getting caught up in a teen mob rioting or shooting. It’s too bad, as it really is a great city.
Comments like, "It's not a Democrat or a Republican issue" only come up when the Democrats are in the line of fire. Whenever Republicans are in charge, it is a full-throated attack. When Democrats are ruining things, then we need to look for "nuance"...
It won't matter which Democrat stooge the people of Austin choose. By choosing Democrats, they are choosing to turn Austin into another liberal shithole...
Sadly, it’s already a liberal shithole
Well it does create a conundrum though. Because many of the Democrat voters in the area are indoctrinated to Vote Blue No Matter Who. They don't know or care to know anything other than blue good, red bad. So what to do with two blues? Oh me, oh my. The consternation.
There will be tears. The ones capable of understanding what incumbent means will likely vote against Garza. (FWIW I am not referring to the working class but to the brain dead youth.) The former long-serving mayor, Adler, is IMO responsible for much of what ails Austin as he attracted like flies to poop people like Cesar and Garza. But in last election Austin elected a moderate, experienced mayor. A Democrat but far more centrist than the last one.
A pig with makeup is still a pig
That's a great observation.
It is not a liberal shithole.
It is a LEFTIST shithole.
These people are ILLIBERAL.
This is a result of the long term PRA policies (People's Republic of Austin). Now, they are not sure how to deal with it. Lots of pearl grabbing. But, they deserve what they get. A useless public defender with a second class law degree. Demoralized police force. Where have we seen this?
Question, How Active is the Texas GOP in Austin? I ask because here in MPLS there is No active GOP Party, or conservative movement. The voters here really have no choice. Oh they'll run some candidates, but no money no support. I believe this is true in many cities.
Chicago is the same; a one-party city with no other option even if voters wanted one.
ah- that explains why my youthful relatives just moved there from Austin (which they moved to from cali about 5 yrs. ago!)
Two quick unrelated points-
1) Crime statistics are murky now. I have seen it here in Philly. In areas where crime has become the norm many crimes go unreported. When citizens know the criminal is likely to be back on the street in their neighborhood, any crime below murder is sometimes unreported. The Austin DA touting a “drop” in crime is likely a drop in reported crime.
2) Isn’t it ironic that safe streets and other ideas like an organized border, functioning and merit based schools, a powerful and judiciously deployed military and controlled government spending are things the Democrats are “returning” to? I have been told for almost a decade that Rs have moved to the extreme right and the D’s are moderate. But if the D’s are “returning” to common sense, maybe they are the ones who moved to the extreme. Trump’s and R policies look a lot like Truman’s, JFK’s and Bill Clinton’s. Yes, Trumpian rhetoric is harsher but perhaps it needs to be to get through what has become a politicized media.
At least in the very large, blue city where I live, measured crime rates went up for two years after the BLM riots and have since dropped from the peak. The reason is that the police chief has deployed the remaining cops (those who didn’t retire or quit to take safer jobs in the suburbs) to the hood to stem the tide of violent crime in those hotspots. Which has been partly successful in those particular areas.
The result is that the rest of the city is nearly unpoliced, and the formerly low and medium crime areas are experiencing something akin to rising anarchy. There are no consequences for crime and even formerly law abiding people take that as an opportunity to simply disregard the law. One manifestation is that you never see any traffic enforcement because it’s a low priority and driving has become dangerous as people run red lights, weave through traffic at high speeds, and even drive on the wrong side of the street as I recently observed. Everyone is becoming more aggressive in their frustration.
So violent crime stats don’t tell the whole story, it’s more complicated, and the quality of life has definitely deteriorated.
Here in Philly I have seen the same thing with city traffic. It's made even worse because there seems to be a corresponding aggressiveness among pedestrians. Drivers are emboldened by lack of enforcement and pedestrians are emboldened because they see the vehicle as the enemy to be challenged by cross the street slowly and ignoring common sense safety.
In Chicago, an attempt to improve crime response with technology is now headed for the scrap heap. ShotSpotter is a system of synchronized microphones that can instantly triangulate the location of a gunshot. But the progressive view is that it results in over-policing, whatever that means, so it must go. Luxury beliefs held by those unaffected by the stray bullets flying in poorer neighborhoods now drive worsening crime clearance rates. The Mayor promised the system would be dismantled.
Actually, the progressive view is that it hears way too many shots in black neighborhoods. That goes against the narrative, and therefore it must be dismantled.
Achieving fitness by removing the mirror and scale.
So…when the data shows crime has dropped, it “doesn’t tell the whole story.” Convenient.
The Dems have created their own statistics by refusing to charge people with crimes.
They've also started labeling every arrested person "white." I found that hard to believe until I looked at the actual websites instead of the screenshots. It's a very simple method of altering statistics to suit their ideological and political goals.
Crime stats have long been manipulated though. Rapes on campus notoriously so because the appearance of an unsafe campus is so bad for business.
Like the FBI's shoplifters!
🎯
Agreed. Lots of games are played with crime stats. "See, look, crime is down = less cops out making less arrests, but actual crime is up."
Like the author, I also lived in Austin during the 1980s, earning two degrees from UT, performing poetry and music all over town, and as a merchandiser for 2 years for Shiner of Austin. Ironically I am headed there today for a doctor’s appointment and have many friends still living there. Two things I can note is that long time “old school” residents blame much of the decline and change on the newcomers, particularly the Californians. And the current homeless have an aggressive desperate edge the old “drag worms” never had. Back in the day Austin was a live and let live town, with hippies, punk rockers, cosmic and authentic cowboys, government employees, and college students living a cheap great harmonious existence. Nowadays Austin has acquired the big city problems of urban blight, income disparity, terrible traffic and, yes, crime unknown in most of Texas, where acting out of line used to be quickly, harshly and largely self policed by the Texan attitude. It’s sad, really, but it seems all the folks pouring in come looking for a legendary laid back lifestyle they are helping to destroy.
The reality is that people who are fleeing problems generally end up bringing those problems along with them. This is true in people's personal lives as well as in population masses. Change can only come from within, not by changing the venue.
Right on Celia!!
The list of cities I used to love but would now never ever move to just keeps growing.
The common thread?
They all put in place progressive DA's and policies.
Not just cities with progressive DAs. I think you’d be hard pressed to find a city that hasn’t gotten worse with respect to crime, filth, taxes and general malaise.
The common thread is the Democratic Party. In all cases...
The Democratic Party is the party of death, nihilism, hatred, anger and despair.
and spending other people's money!!
These cities have had Dem govts for decades. They were liberal, not progressive. The DEI folk running these cities now are just nuts - and illiberal.
But it's the city voters who put these people in office. Radical leftists cannot govern -- the cities are falling apart, and the voters still elect them.
It's demographics and sociology. The balancing middle class - the middle of all races has left the city --priced and taxed out, schools, crime, and more crime --has left city elections to large numbers of poor, many also migrants, who will vote for redistribution, and, it appears, anti- white rhetoric. Look at New York's anti- law enforcement, anti- white, anti- American, anti-voter integrity- it voted to give non- citizens the vote and was rebuffed by the courts -- anti- capitalist city council. These things used to be called sedition. The council reflects the electorate. Absolutely, there are some who don't feel that way, but they are out-numbered by the above and by rich, progressive elites. And let's not forget the drmographic/generational change and voting patterns after decades of indoctrination.
You're seeing what happens without the social glue of the " bourgeois" middle class, when it doesn't hold. Or, as in the cases of Seattle and Portland, the far left takes over. I think people are intimidated from addressing the demographics of crime and decline. And we stand by and watch our cities become dystopian sink holes.
I still call it sedition. But in Austin it is the poorer people forced out. There is no rent control there, rents are through the roof and the people who own houses that have been in their families for generations can no longer afford the taxes.
Sedition- conduct "amounting to insurrection; conduct tending to treason, but without an overt act; excitement of discontent against the government, or of resistance to lawful authority."
The American Heritage® Dictionary
Let’s see what happens. I agree things are looking slightly better but Democrats have been doing a horrible job for quite a while and are masters of projection. It seems to me what and who are screwing up has been obvious for a long time. Now Democrats elites are being affected, which they seemed perfectly happy when others have to deal with it, now it’s a crisis!
Why do so many billionaires like Lubetzky choose to be progressive/liberal and vote, lobby and donate to causes aimed directly at destroying the country and system that allowed them to achieve great success? From the safety of their walled-off opulent claves protected by armed security, they decry inequality yet are unwilling to live a modest lifestyle similar to that of the unwashed masses. Why would you not protect and promote the system that facilitated their success so that others have a chance to also succeed? Perhaps they're insecure that if others succeed it will threaten to dilute their standing among the elite.
Their progressive positions assuage their guilt for their success. And allow for virtue signaling.
I don’t understand the guilt thing that some of the very wealthy have. Then to assuage that guilt by virtue signaling as a progressive or even a Marxist is dishonest in my view. I don’t see any of the guilt-ridden forfeiting their wealth and lifestyle. Start a charity, scholarship fund, mentorship academies…anything that will foster productivity and motivation in poor communities. Just don’t try to destroy the very thing, this country and market system, that allows one to become wealthy.
I was so shocked when Obama didn't offer housing to the illegals dropped off in Martha's Vineyard.
Exactly!
I believe the writer Rob Henderson (who was recently featured in FP) sums it up with the phrase "luxury beliefs." I used to live in Fairfield County, Connecticut, a very affluent area that is now largely Dem. The progressive left's fave policies (green investment, LGBTQ anything, and more of the same blah blah) play well there because, well, they're fashionable policies and those in that county (and much of the rest of the state) are, if nothing else, fashionable. But lately their greedy side is on display everywhere in Connecticut as they vote down proposal after proposal that would bring affordable housing to their towns. (In Connecticut, towns rule - there are no county governments so there is none of the equalizing impact of, say, countywide school systems which are the norm in places such as Maryland and, where I grew up, in Florida.) Their motto could be "no Levittowns in my town!" Even though, working class suburbs such as Levittown (there were actually three) were actually the biggest contribution to post-WWII upward mobility that ever happened.
I sometimes think it is like burning the bridge behind them. They were able to get wild success...but KEEPING that success is difficult if the system still allows hard working people with good ideas to possibly surpass you. So, once you are in power, you change the rules so other people can't climb up to your level.
classic saying is "I'm aboard so pull up the ladder!"
Rob Henderdon's luxury beliefs theory. I think he nailed it.
This is a very good question. Free Press should be interviewing Lubetzky , Soros, etc.
What do you call a guy that says he’s an independent but votes only for democrats? A democrat.
And it seems like Garza hates women. Maybe he’s a closet predator?
Democrats are "returning" to law and order.
That they ever left it, while imposing authoritarian thought crimes on those who dared contradict the utterly idiotic, low IQ idea of "defunding the police" and no longer prosecuting certain crimes ought to mean, to anyone with half a brain (sadly, there aren't many) should wipe the Dems off the map for all of us. Unfortunately, I have recently engaged with Democrat voters who DENY CRIME EXISTS AT ALL...DENY THE DEMOGRAPHICS MOST RESPONSIBLE FOR IT....
NEVER FORGET THE HARM THAT THE DEMOCRAT PROGRESSIVES HAVE DONE TO US ALL.
I will never vote Democrat again.
Vote for a sewer, live in a sewer. Don't be lazy on Tuesday. Vote for a return to civilized behavior.
Garza will win, because the majority of the residents of "progressive " cities are idiots
Exactly. Sylestine said, "I think I appeal to somebody who is smart and has common sense."
That description does not apply to most of people who will be voting.
I think universal suffrage is a mistake.
I am not sure it matters. Once the electorate realizes (as Ben Franklin so astutely warned) that they can vote for the government to give them money, the whole system becomes corrupt. The rich and powerful have been engaging in regulatory capture for over a century.
In Franklin's day you had to have a vested interest in the form of owning property before being eligible to cast a vote. If you're a parasite you don't get a say.
Come now. Renters aren't "parasites." All over New York City are hardworking middle- and working-class people who rent apartments.
While I understand our Founding Fathers' idea that you need some skin in the game to vote, in fact today there are plenty of Americans who own homes, or own even several or more homes, whom you would prefer not to have a say in the running of our country.
Dear B, I didn't mean to imply that renters are parasites. Leftists are vermin and some are parasites.
What good is money when your neighbor can steal it at will with no consequences?
Or the government can print so much more as to render the value of your savings worthless.
That gave me quite a laugh. Thanks. I'll play. I think tests of government/civics literacy should be required before voting.
That should another prerequisite.
Summary: Modern Democrats are locusts. Which is why no normal people anywhere in normal America like to see the the new refugee neighbors turn up with a rainbow flag and an "In this house we believe" yard sign.
My sign reads differently:
"In this house we believe that if you have to tell your neighbors what you believe with a sign in your front yard, then your beliefs are probably trivial phrases that can be summed up in yard signs..."
In this house, we believe in paradox."
In this house, we believe in IRONY would be more appropriate...
Hearing the stories of the (true) victims, boils my blood. Of course the stats show improvement.......like most progressive cities, people either aren't reporting the crime because they know nothing will happen or the perpetrator is getting off without any punishment. I can say I lose weight everyday if I never weigh myself!
Its just like the economy. Or cherry picked data says that things are fine, so all of the people not doing fine are wrong.
Maybe more Austin residents need to take advantage of Texas' permit-free open carry law, but then, Garza would probably throw the book at them should an incident occur.
This is why these DAs have been such a focus for people like Soros. They realized they don't have to change laws...which is difficult, if you control the people who prosecute those laws.
Bingo!
We went from activist courts to activist prosecutors.
He would. For awhile the only prosecutions you could count on from him were of law enforcement officers. The Austin PD is completely demoralized. A new class of cadets did not graduate from.the academy for over two years while the curriculum was adjusted. Meanwhile ever officer with seniority who could get out did. So now APD is largely staffed with very inexperienced officers, including cadets trained in woke ideology. And that 500 number is low from what I hear.
It is. So glad that Abbott brought in the DPS to help patrol. Yet the idiots on the city council whined about the great job they did. Unfortunately the axiom is true: You can’t fix stupid.
IDK. I think most Democrats are unwaveringly dedicated to self-immolation.
No, they want to immolate everyone else.