Recent news that Walgreens has now closed 17 of its 70 stores in San Francisco due to “out of control” shoplifting probably didn’t wow many Americans, but it’s additional confirmation of a fact that’s become painfully obvious in the last few decades: Democratic and progressive policies in deep blue areas are increasingly making life for ordinary citizens unlivable.
Article by Nicholas L. Waddy from WND.
In San Francisco, the problem goes back to a weak-on-crime limousine liberal philosophy that would have been familiar to Dirty Harry as he patrolled (fictionally) the mean streets of Frisco back in the early ’70s. Then, starting in the ’80s, Californians came to their senses and cracked down on violence and criminality. Even Kamala Harris got in on the act, rising in Golden State politics based on a reputation for toughness as a prosecutor and then as California’s attorney general.
Give them enough time, though, and the bleeding hearts will always return to their roots. In 2014, California voters passed a proposition that made it a misdemeanor, instead of a felony, to steal anything worth less than $950. The idea was, of course, that no one – especially not a person of color – should face imprisonment or be burdened with a rap sheet because of mere thievery.
The problem, of course, is that making the consequences for theft less onerous encourages the less honest and scrupulous among us to steal. San Francisco deadbeats seem to have gotten the message. Losses to shoplifting in San Francisco Walgreens and CVS stores are several times what they are at typical drug stores, and the costs of security in the Bay Area are sky-high. Increasingly, retail chains are reaching the obvious and inevitable conclusion that doing business in San Francisco is impossible.
Of course, left-wing weak-on-crime policies have had similar effects for decades, and in the last year, the costs of “defunding” and demonizing the police have become more and more apparent. Crime rates in cities like San Francisco have soared. Urban residents thus face a lot more than mere inconvenience in their purchases of medications and toiletries – they face substantially increased risks of assault, mugging, carjacking, rape and murder, because Democratic politicians are more concerned with the rights of criminals than they are with the rights and quality of life of law-abiding citizens.
A Republican or a conservative might be tempted to object at this stage, “Ah! But there’s a silver lining, surely. The decreasing livability and increasing lethality of deep blue jurisdictions proves, as mere rhetoric never could, the utter absurdity and toxicity of ‘progressive’ policies.” Furthermore, once voters experience this epiphany, we would expect them to draw the appropriate conclusions and “throw the bums out,” replacing leftist, Democratic leadership with solid Republicans.
If life were fair and people were sensible, this argument would hold. Well, life isn’t, and people aren’t.
The sad fact is, when naive and/or extreme Democratic and progressive policies lead to disaster, the Democrats and progressives, instead of being exposed as charlatans, rise to the occasion and find ways to redirect the public’s ire. What that means, in practice, is that the left-wing Democratic politicians and activists – who are charlatans, but who aren’t fools – concoct alternative narratives that explain the shuttered storefronts, vicious crime sprees and frightful unemployment rates in their own backyards. These narratives pin urban blight on, you guessed it, the left’s favorite boogeymen: conservatives, Republicans, white people, the rich, corporations, Christians, gun owners, etc.
In the case of the shrinking retail economy of San Francisco, Democrats and progressives will inevitably fall back on that ultimate chart-topper of the left-wing hit parade: “systemic racism.” Surely, the argument goes, Walgreens’ refusal to serve the mostly BIPOC (black, indigenous and people of color) population of the City of San Francisco is a reflection of their rapacious capitalism, rooted ultimately in their (conscious or unconscious) racism and their enthrallment to America’s original sin of white supremacy. The result of Walgreens’ departure from certain San Francisco neighborhoods will, after all, be to deprive people of color of necessary services, and anything that harms minorities is, ipso facto, a product and a proof of ingrained American racism. Case closed.
The sad part, from the dyed-in-the-wool Critical Race Theory perspective, is that Walgreens could have done the right thing: It could have absorbed the losses associated with shoplifting in mostly BIPOC communities, viewing it as a form of reparations for the long history of injustice and oppression visited upon hapless minorities. It could have passed along the cost of those tacit reparations to its (mostly white) customers in other, less sticky-fingered neighborhoods. No harm done.
But instead Walgreens chose to punish the good people of San Francisco for their trivial infractions of outdated, racist laws. Shameful!
The fact is, therefore, that, while Democratic and progressive policies have utterly and consistently failed to solve the problems of urban America – instead, they have exacerbated them – the likelihood is that Democrats’ unbroken (since 1964) control of San Francisco politics will continue, and it may even be further entrenched. Meanwhile, Democrats’ iron grip on urban American politics in general seems destined not just to persist, but to extend itself gradually into our increasingly diverse suburbs. Democrats will not be punished for their failed policies, in other words – they will be rewarded! That’s because registered Democrats, who predominate in urban areas, accept almost unanimously the pack of lies about American racism and the wickedness of conservatives that Democratic politicians have been feeding them for decades. The real world performance of Democratic policies is, to these diehards, irrelevant.
This realization can only serve to depress those of who believe in conservative principles and in good governance – but there is a slim ray of hope. If urban America and the Democratic Party are beyond salvation and immune to reason, as it appears they are, moderate and independent voters are another story. These relatively open-minded, and unquestionably decisive, voters may not find the Democratic/progressive false narrative about urban blight compelling. When Democrats propose to these ordinary Americans that, against all the evidence of our senses, San Francisco, Seattle, Portland, Chicago and New York are models for what a truly progressive America could and should be like, they may just recoil. If so, then conservatives will have a chance to propagate their own narratives and expose the last several decades of Democratic rule in urban America for what it was and is: a travesty of epic proportions.
‘The Purge’ by Big Tech targets conservatives, including us
Just when we thought the Covid-19 lockdowns were ending and our ability to stay afloat was improving, censorship reared its ugly head.
For the last few months, NOQ Report, Conservative Playbook, and the American Conservative Movement have appealed to our readers for assistance in staying afloat through Covid-19 lockdowns. The downturn in the economy has limited our ability to generate proper ad revenue just as our traffic was skyrocketing. We had our first sustained stretch of three months with over a million visitors in November, December, and January, but February saw a dip.
It wasn’t just the shortened month. We expected that. We also expected the continuation of dropping traffic from “woke” Big Tech companies like Google, Facebook, and Twitter, but it has actually been much worse than anticipated. Our Twitter account was banned. Both of our YouTube accounts were banned. Facebook “fact-checks” everything we post. Spotify canceled us. Medium canceled us. Apple canceled us. Why? Because we believe in the truth prevailing, and that means we will continue to discuss “taboo” topics.
The 2020 presidential election was stolen. You can’t say that on Big Tech platforms without risking cancellation, but we’d rather get cancelled for telling the truth rather than staying around to repeat mainstream media’s lies. They have been covering it up since before the election and they’ve convinced the vast majority of conservative news outlets that they will be harmed if they continue to discuss voter fraud. We refuse to back down. The truth is the truth.
The lies associated with Covid-19 are only slightly more prevalent than the suppression of valid scientific information that runs counter to the prescribed narrative. We should be allowed to ask questions about the vaccines, for example, as there is ample evidence for concern. One does not have to be an “anti-vaxxer” in order to want answers about vaccines that are still considered experimental and that have a track record in a short period of time of having side-effects, including death. One of our stories about the Johnson & Johnson “vaccine” causing blood clots was “fact-checked” and removed one day before the government hit the brakes on it. These questions and news items are not allowed on Big Tech which is just another reason we are getting canceled.
There are more topics that they refuse to allow. In turn, we refuse to stop discussing them. This is why we desperately need your help. The best way NOQ, CP, and ACM readers can help is to donate. Our Giving Fuel page makes it easy to donate one-time or monthly. Alternatively, you can donate through PayPal as well. We are pacing to be short by about $3700 per month in order to maintain operations.
The second way to help is to become a partner. We’ve strongly considered seeking angel investors in the past but because we were paying the bills, it didn’t seem necessary. Now, we’re struggling to pay the bills. We had 5,657,724 sessions on our website from November, 2020, through February, 2021. Our intention is to elevate that to higher levels this year by focusing on a strategy that relies on free speech rather than being beholden to progressive Big Tech companies.
During that four-month stretch, Twitter and Facebook accounted for about 20% of our traffic. We are actively working on operating as if that traffic is zero, replacing it with platforms that operate more freely such as Gab, Parler, and others. While we were never as dependent on Big Tech as most conservative sites, we’d like to be completely free from them. That doesn’t mean we will block them, but we refuse to be beholden to companies that absolutely despise us simply because of our political ideology.
We’re heading in the right direction and we believe we’re ready talk to patriotic investors who want to not only “get in on the action” but more importantly who want to help America hear the truth. Interested investors should contact me directly with the contact button above.
As the world spirals towards radical progressivism, the need for truthful journalism has never been greater. But in these times, we need as many conservative media voices as possible. Please help keep NOQ Report going.
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