Take heart, Democrats are finally getting the message that voters are sick of the death of crime, there are signs. Make it some Democrats.
A storm is brewing on at least three fronts, and the good news is that the White House is on the right side this time.
President Biden surprised many in his own party by backing a Republican-led House bill to repeal a landmark plan in Washington, D.C., to reduce sentences for murders, carjackings and other violent crimes in the nation’s capital. .
Biden’s move, a flip-flop from earlier positions, came despite his support for home rule and statehood for D.C.
Attempting to square that circle, the White House noted that the move to lighter sentences was opposed by Mayor Muriel Bowser but was overridden by the City Council over her veto.
“He believes in keeping the 700,000 residents in DC safe. And so he’s taking this action because it’s coming to him,” press secretary Karin Jean-Pierre argued Friday.
Unless you’re a stickler for claims of coincidence, you know the shifting political sands had everything to do with Biden’s face.
He has been coolly unconcerned about rising crime for most of his presidency and his sudden concern came as normally reliable blue-state voters turned against top Dem incumbents in a bloodbath.
One of the highest profile cases involved Gov. Hochul, who was nearly upset by GOP candidate Lee Zeldin, who had a laser-like focus on crime.
Then came Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who was beaten in her bid for a second term.
Chicago has been mired in bloodshed during Lightfoot’s tenure, with 700 or more murders in each of the last three years.
Its homicide rate is five times that of New York City, which had 438 murders last year despite having 6 million more.
Polls showed that more than 70% of Chicago voters ranked crime and public safety as their first or second most important issue, but Lightfoot had an ear and insisted that he and his police superintendent would not change course.
So the voters changed the mayor.
A black lesbian, Lightfoot blamed her loss on racism and gender bias.
Asked by a reporter if she had been mistreated, she said, “I’m a black woman in America. Of course.”
Oddly enough, his race, gender and sexual orientation did not prevent him from winning in a landslide four years ago.
He is only a victim of his own arrogance and incompetence.
Although homicides and shootings in Chicago have declined so far this year, overall serious crime is still up 52%, including a 143% increase in auto theft, according to the latest police data.
To be sure, the voters’ decision is far from complete.
Lightfoot finished third in the nonpartisan race, receiving just 17% of the vote in a field of nine, with the top two finishers facing each other next month.
The leader, former school superintendent Paul Vallas, won 34% of the vote, running on an anti-crime agenda and promising to hire an additional 2,000 police officers.
Runner-up Brendan Johnson got 20%, pledging to raise taxes and cut the police budget.
In addition to being hopelessly permissive on crime, Johnson is also a tool of the Chicago teachers unions, some of the most radical in the country.
Unions staged an 11-day strike in the fall of 2019 over pay and other issues.
Bail riots in Albany
While the Chicago runoff is a clear referendum on crime and progressivism, New York Dems continue their civil war in Albany — with a twist.
David Soares, the county district attorney, is fighting with progressives in the Legislature in 2019 to make far-reaching changes to bail and other laws.
And although race is usually an unspoken subtext in crime debates, this time it’s front and center because Soares and the legislative leaders of both chambers are black.
The battle was joined when word leaked that Soares, representing a prosecutors’ association, planned to denounce the 2019 changes and demand their rollback.
For daring to tell the truth legislators didn’t want to hear, Soares was allegedly summoned the night before to speak.
Although his prepared remarks were eventually read into the record, the secret maneuvers allowed the offending Cuddlers to avoid the public confrontation they would have otherwise lost.
This is because Soares framed his argument in a compelling way.
For example, when talking about changes in the bail law, he brought facts to show that claims about the disproportionate impact of the old law on the poor were not true.
“The perception that so many people were arrested on minor charges with low bail amounts was simply wrong,” Soares was prepared to say.
His most explosive comments focused on race, such as when he contrasted the stated rationale behind the changes with the actual results three years later.
“These reforms have had the most devastating impact on black and brown communities,” he wrote. “If you look honestly at the data — the increase in crime, the victims of those crimes, and the location of the most violent crimes, the correlation is pretty clear.”
Of course, there have been previous attempts by other Dems to free the party from the left’s “save the police” movement. Mayor Adams has made Gotham’s violent crime increase a focus of his 2021 campaign and has made progress in reducing murders and shootings, although the city has a long way to go to restore public trust.
But Adams and his ilk have been the exception, with Biden and other so-called moderates surrendering leadership to loonies and loudmouths who declare the police the problem and criminalize the victims.
Will this time be different? Do you believe in miracles?
Unexpected lady companion
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in an interview with Wall Street Journal columnist Walter Russell Mead at a Hertog Forum event, made several interesting statements, including this one: “Christian Zionism preceded Jewish Zionism. It is doubtful whether Jewish Zionism would have succeeded without centuries of Christian Zionism, particularly the 19th century Christian Zionists in Britain and the United States.
‘First’ in Scandal
They are number 1!
Joe and Hunter Biden are making history in all the wrong ways.
Noting the president’s handling of classified documents and Hunter’s investigation into tax and other issues, Fox News made it clear: “The Bidens became the first father-son duo to simultaneously — but separately — President made history. Be subject to federal investigation.”
