Cities

As the song goes: “Chicago, that toddlin’ town.” It was certainly toddlin’ in the 1950s and 1960s, when that song was a hit for Frank Sinatra. The city had bounced back from the Great Depression, begun building skyscrapers again and renewed its status as a vibrant financial and commercial hub. But Chicago has gone from toddlin’ to totterin’, thanks largely to incompetent governance by a succession of local officials – and far better leadership and lower taxes elsewhere in the country, in the places people are moving to. The city’s latest bungler, Mayor Brandon Johnson, was an apparatchik in the Chicago Teachers Union, the most powerful union in the state of Illinois.

Americans may never before have felt their country was farther from its finest hour. And yet, on the Fourth of July last year, residents gathered in the heart of its birthplace for an ever-rarer expression of patriotic sentiment. It was to be a brief display. Blood spilled before the clock struck ten. Though no one saw a gunman or heard gunfire, two police officers were struck by stray bullets on the famous steps of the Philadelphia Art Museum. Word spread quickly, and suddenly no one could be sure whether they were hearing fireworks or gunshots. On the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, patriotism turned to terror, then shrieks gave way to silence.

2022 is proving to be the year in which progressives’ genius ideas come home to roost. Instituting far-left policies in cities across America has resulted in disastrous outcomes. All this raises the question: which Democrats will stay loyal to the far-left “transformational” agenda and which will jump ship? Most liberal politicians have enjoyed this country’s tidal wave of wokeness up until now. Posting Instagram infographics and hash-tagging activism on Twitter plays well with younger voters. Real news has become almost indistinguishable from the Babylon Bee’s satire. In a single day, you can read about snowplow equity, M&Ms becoming more inclusive and students identifying as cats. Say what you will about the perpetually offended, they certainly are entertaining.

The father of a UCLA grad student, Brianna Kupfer, who was stabbed to death last week, is giving voice to the gut-wrenching human toll of the violent crime wave ravaging the nation — and the social and political forces enabling it. “What’s endemic in our society right now is that everyone seems oriented on giving back rights and bestowing favor on people that rob others of their rights,” said the grieving dad on Fox News. Brianna, a graduate student and design consultant, was found dead by a customer at the furniture store where she worked. On Wednesday, Los Angeles police identified her suspected killer, a 31-year-old career criminal named Shawn Laval Smith who was out on $1,000 bail for a misdemeanor.

Preventing crime and punishing offenders is primarily the responsibility of local authorities. They have no greater obligation to the citizens who elected them and who fund the government. It is up to local police, supervised by political leaders and subject to the law themselves, to provide a safe environment for citizens to go about their lives, pursuing their own goals in peace and security. It is up to local politicians to ensure that police are adequately funded and properly trained. It is up to local prosecutors to follow up all justified arrests and prosecute offenders when the evidence is adequate. When police overstep their limits, prosecutors should pursue them too. The goal is a safe environment, subject to the rule of law.

It’s not known when Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot experienced the first stirrings of her secret GOP gland, but knowledgeable conjecture puts it perhaps two nanoseconds after taking the oath of office in 2019. It’s then that Lightfoot, buoyant after having been swept into office with 74 percent of the vote, surely had an alarming thought: ‘OMG, I’m mayor. What do I do now?’ All Democratic politicians aspiring to executive office have a secret Republican gland, although it’s vestigial till they sit behind an executive desk. When it’s dormant they can sign up for any damn fool notion. During her mayoral campaign, Lightfoot had cheerfully endorsed both an elected school board and an elected police board.

We are currently house-hunting — please let me know if you have one going spare. We are looking for a home in the north-east of England in any constituency which was once solidly Labour and is now in the talons of a brutally right-wing Conservative MP — this is my wife’s stipulation and I find it fair enough. However, we do not want to live too near the poor people. In truth we had been casually looking across a vast swath of Northumberland, Durham and North Yorkshire for a good half-dozen or more years, but until now there had been little urgency to the business. We marvelled at the property market up there: houses, grossly overpriced, would remain on sale for quite literally years.

Have you met Tina? You may have seen her this month leading a charge outside Mac’s Public House on Staten Island, protesting a second wave of economic terrorism against small business owners enacted by Mayor Bill de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo.The fiery, bombastic blond with the thick New York accent and colorful vocabulary has shown up at anti-lockdown events across the city, broadcasting footage to her 206,000 Twitter followers at a time when everyday New York Republicans are having a bit of time in the spotlight. https://twitter.com/RealTina40/status/1335652275532992512 A couple of years ago, the city cheered Vickie Paladino, a mom from Queens who was driving home one day and saw de Blasio surrounded by reporters on the street.

BaltimoreRepublicans are an oddity in Baltimore. Perhaps some older Americans remember Spiro Agnew, but that’s more or less it — until now.About a year ago, Kim Klacik was a local GOP leader in Baltimore County. Today, she has nearly 400,000 Twitter followers along with an endorsement from President Trump in her campaign for Maryland’s 7th district. What exactly sparked this fame? Klacik showcased the rat-infested, crime-ridden streets of Baltimore for the nation.‘Do you care about black lives?’ Klacik asked in a viral campaign video. ‘The people that run Baltimore don’t. I can prove it. Walk with me.