Below is my column in The Hill on the rise in crime, particularly “smash and grab” operations. This weekend, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was hit by business groups for denying that there is a rise in such crime. Absent such denials, however, the cause of the rise in crime remains a matter of fierce debate. The White House and others have reached for a familiar culprit: the Pandemic. Call it the Loki Effect.
Here is the column:
Crime is raging across the country, from violent attacks to brazen shoplifting to mob “smash and grab” attacks. The White House this week had a simple answer for the cause of this rising lawlessness: It was not “defund the police” efforts, or more restrictive policies for police and prosecutors. It was the familiar scourge cited in debates ranging from infrastructure to supply chains to tax increases — the pandemic.
The pandemic now seems to have reached the mythic level of gods who once were blamed for everything that went wrong in life. Africans had Anansi the Spider, while the Norse had the trickster Loki. Both were known to assume different identities to wreak disorder or steal precious things.
For politicians, it is useful to have a lurking Loki to explain that social problems are not really of their making, the result of their failures. The Loki factor was evident in the press conference this week when Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy asked about the rising lawlessness seen in major cities such as New York, Chicago and Los Angeles: “Does the president still think that crime is up because of the pandemic?” White House press secretary Jen Psaki replied that “many people have conveyed that.”
Doocy persisted: “So when a huge group of criminals organizes themselves and they want to go loot a store — a CVS, a Nordstrom, a Home Depot until the shelves are clean — do you think that’s because of the pandemic?” Psaki replied: “I think a root cause in a lot of communities is the pandemic, yes.”
That damned Loki.
Whole stores have been ransacked by gangs, and the crime is sweeping large and small businesses alike. At the same time, shoplifting has reached such high levels in cities like San Francisco that stores like Walgreens are closing up due to the losses.
Yet, some in the media have echoed the spin that such brazen crimes are simply responses to the dire conditions caused by the pandemic. When the CBS morning news played a clip of a man nonchalantly clearing a shelf of hair-care products into a garbage bag and then riding his bike out of a Walgreens, co-host Tony Dokoupil insisted that it seems like “an act of desperation. I mean, you’re not getting rich off what you take from a Walgreens, you’re getting probably something you need. I don’t know the details of that particular case.” Indeed, the first priority for most people in a pandemic is to steal dozens of hair-care products.
It also appears that pandemic sustenance-gatherers felt compelled to grab $79,000-worth of purses from a Givenchy store in New York. Purses certainly do appear to be a COVID necessity across this accessory-deprived nation: When a gang hit Burberry’s on the Magnificent Mile in Chicago, they ran past an assortment of clothing to grab high-priced purses, too.
Crimes have gotten so bad in New York that the CEO of Bank of America this week sent out suggestions on how employees should “dress down” and take other survival measures to avoid victimization. Citibank is offering car services to avoid having to walk the streets of the city.
For years, many of these cities have seen calls to “defund the police,” and many, like New York City, have cut police budgets. Groups like the ACLU insisted that “defunding police will make us safer.” Undercover units and gun-violence units have been eliminated; police practices, from the pursuit of certain suspects to traffic enforcement, have been curtailed or stopped. Prosecutors also have faced policy and legal changes on decriminalization, parole opposition and other law-enforcement limitations.
In some cities, like San Francisco, police largely stopped responding to shoplifting calls after state law was changed to make the theft of merchandise worth $950 or less just a misdemeanor. Career prosecutors have quit there after the election of District Attorney Chesa Boudin, who is blamed for a sharp decrease in prosecutions.
In New York, Democratic politicians have pushed through sweeping criminal reforms that include “clean slate” legislation that would seal criminal misdemeanors after three years and felonies after seven years. The convictions would later be expunged completely; millions of offenses erased. That includes violent offenses.
While many politicians still call for “reimagining policing,” that imagination does not extend to seeing a cause-and-effect with rising crime levels. Instead, it is the Loki effect of … the pandemic.
The fact is that most criminals are rational actors who make a calculus of risk in the commission of offenses. The mobs hitting stores like Bloomingdales are organized gangs. Even shoplifters stealing from stores like Costco and Target are known to quickly sell the goods on the internet through fences.
In 1968, University of Chicago economist Gary Becker wrote his famous article, “Crime and Punishment,” in which he argued that criminals make calculations based on both the certainty and the severity of punishment. If you increase the certainty or likelihood of punishment, you can achieve deterrence with lower levels of punishment. Conversely, if there is a low detection rate for crime, you can deter some crimes with higher levels of punishment.
What is happening in cities like San Francisco is that both the certainty and the severity of punishment has fallen below deterrence levels.
Consider the recent brazen smash-and-grabs at malls in the city, in which almost $350,000 worth of goods were stolen. After rising complaints from citizens, the city finally moved aggressively and arrested 14 people. Yet all were immediately released upon processing under “no bail” laws. If prosecuted, they expect relatively light sentences. For other felons, this is an easy calculation: Hundreds of thousands of dollars in goods can be stolen with a low likelihood of capture and a relatively low severity of punishment.
While the Biden White House may not see the cause-and-effect realities, these felons certainly see the cost-benefit realities.
We are all living in a pandemic, but most of us do not look for a Givenchy store to grab an essential diamond-encrusted purse. That is the action of someone who is certain about the value of the purse — but not about the likelihood of prosecution.
It still remains unclear whether this pandemic was man-made or just a natural occurrence. However, the rise in crime in our cities is strictly a man-made epidemic.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. You can find his updates on Twitter @JonathanTurley.
Progressives say citizens don’t need guns because the police will come.
Then they defund many police and castrate those who are left.
Then they let thousands of criminals out of prison and into communities.
Then they blame the anarchy, violence and robbery on Covid.
They don’t blame China and Fauci for Covid.
It’s almost as if they are intentionally stoking discord and chaos. I wonder what the endgame of that could be.
Sam,
I have been wondering that too. In the Duke Lacrosse case, in the Zimmerman/Trayvon case, in the Ferguson shooting, in the George Floyd death and in many others the corporate media along with the DOJ have been caught in falsehoods that could only have been intended to stoke racial division and hostility. CRT is the same.
What is the goal of this? Are foreign actors partly behind it? So many questions.
No doubt foreign actors (especially China) are cheering and abetting chaos in America — especially via their propaganda efforts, particularly at universities, and their “joint ventures” with politicians and corporations. Their goal, of course, is to denigrate America, and in particular her individualism and capitalism.
But it’s the home-grown actors, especially those in academia, who seek to transform America into a tribalist cesspool. The cases you mention are always, for them, just a means to their ideological (tribalist) ends: “Oh, look. We can promote tribalism here, and here, and there. Facts be damned. Oh, you mean there wasn’t a race angle in the Duke lacrosse hoax, or the KR case? Oh, well. We’ll gin up another racist angle, tomorrow.”
In the real world, ideology conforms to facts. In an academic’s and journalist’s fantasy world, “facts” conform to ideology. It’s a classic Kantian move: “Consciousness is the lawgiver of nature.”
Consider the source. Goebbels said that the biggest threat to Germany was Jews. What do you expect?
Russia is all about what Russia wants. What about what Ukraine wants? Maybe Ukraine wants to become a member of NATO. Maybe Ukraine does not want thousands of Russian troops pouring into their nation. Did Russia ever consider that? If Russians can massacre Ukrainians, then it is only fair that NATO can massacre Russians.
Evil countries should not get to do the same kinds of things that good countries can do.
This short video demonstrates what I explained earlier about the operation of a single-action revolver, showing how easy it is to see if it is loaded, how it won’t fire on half-cock, how the hammer must be pulled all the way back and trigger pulled on a loaded gun for it to shoot. Baldwin’s gun did not load itself and did not shoot itself. What he did is a little like putting on a blindfold and driving down a street. When you hit something it isn’t the car’s fault.
https://youtu.be/SwYvvTu-UYM
The expansion of goodness is a good thing. If evil doesn’t like it, that’s too bad. Why do you have a problem with goodness encroaching on evil?
For a double-standard to exist, the two things being compared must be equal. The United States and Russia are not moral or political equals.
The United States and Russia are not moral or political equals.
The United Nations has determined otherwise.
However, the rise in crime in our cities is strictly a man-made epidemic.
It has been decades in the making – where entire neighborhoods in American cities have been rendered economic deserts blotted with tent cities, liquor stores, pawn shops, check cashing and payday loan vultures. Opportunity is relegated to smash and grab in the upscale sections of town.
Rural America has also been afflicted by this man-made epidemic where large swaths of once highly productive regions of the “Rust Belt” and Appalachia have been reduced to wastelands of economic deprivation.
One of the differences between urban economic deprivation and rural economic deprivation is in urban areas there are upscale shops that may be plundered in order to sate the greedy/envious desires of the have-nots; whereas in rural America the victims of economic deprivation channel their angst via suicide.
It is not a pretty picture but the policies that have destroyed and continue to destroy tens of millions of American lives is stamped:
Made in America
“What is happening in cities like San Francisco is that both the certainty and the severity of punishment has fallen below deterrence levels.”
Strange words from a criminal defense attorney!
Turley is a very intelligent liberal sellout who loves money…thus, his right-wing facade for his retail customers……
Liberal as in divergent in principle?
Putin’s hypocrisy is this: as a sovereign nation, Russia can put its forces wherever it wants inside its own borders, but a sovereign nation like Ukraine cannot accept weapons and equipment, and join a military alliance (NATO) if it wants to?
Russia is responding to the violence and division of Ukraine through a coup without cause.
Russia has been invaded twice, from Europe, within the past couple of hundred years at great cost in blood and treasure. Now another apparently hostile foe, with considerable martial power, wants to consolidate its European military alliance and place troops and weapons on Russia’s border. And all this after constant reassurances by NATO that it would not expand its military alliance eastward.
Putin might be (more than) a little concerned about NATO’s aggressive expansion into the Ukraine after it incited a color revolution there, then instigated and financed a civil war against Ukraine’s ethic Russian citizens.
How would the U.S. respond to Russia doing something similar in Latin America — inciting a coup in Mexico, instigating and financing a civil war near the U.S. border, and a military alliance which would put Russian troops and weapons in Mexico?
You mean like Venezuela.
There is a Mockingbird on your shoulder…
Guess they should have thought of that before they spent 45 years turning all of Eastern Europe into a series of puppet states. Now they need to sit down, shut up, and stick to improving their own country, staring with ridding themselves of the dictator in the Kremlin.
You’re trying to rationalize Putin’s desire to conquer Ukraine?!
Why not just stick with the simple explanation? — He has a desire to conquer Ukraine. That’s what dictators do.
So the Trump administration brought us record low unemployment for blacks, control of our southern border, energy independence, rapid growth of the economy and growing pay for employees, three vaccines for the Wuhan virus in less than a year but was attacked constantly by the MSM.
On the other hand in just 10 months Biden has opened our borders, created Saigon Part II with Afghanistan which left behind Americans and friendlies, humiliated our troops and our country globally, destroyed our energy independence, saw inflation take off due to his economic programs, pushed vaccine mandates, and botched the rollout of the vaccines.
Turley says:
“It still remains unclear whether this pandemic was man-made or just a natural occurrence.”
This admission proves that Turley is a Never Trumper. Trumpists know it was a Chinese biological weapon.
Whoopie Cushion is a Never Brainer.
I applaud you for your commitment to call me names. You would not act so if we knew who you were. You know who I am. I am not ashamed of what I post.
I am not ashamed of what I post. — jeffsilberman
You should be… it makes you look like a fool.
If I respected your opinion, I would care what you think, but I dismiss the opinions of lying Trumpists.
Jeff, get a clue. One puppet master is posting about half the comments on these threads. And he has no scruples whatsoever. Turley employs him to keep liberals away. Turley knows how uncool the puppets are, but that’s the whole idea.
ATS: “Jeff, get a clue.”
++
He won’t. As I said, he’s a Never Brainer.
Looks like the Dems and the Ministry of Truth have had an exceptionally busy year. To wit:
Afghanistan was an “extraordinary success”
No American was ever “stranded” in Afghanistan
The Build Back Better program will “cost nothing”
Zero COVID is possible (because “science”)
COVID-19 is a disease of the unvaccinated (because “science”)
Natural immunity isn’t relevant–only vaccine acquired immunity counts (because “science”)
If you adjust for rising prices, inflation is pretty much under control
Border crisis….what border crisis?! (because if you don’t report on something it simply ceases to exist)
The supply chain crisis is simply the “tragedy of the treadmill delayed”
Inflation is a “rich person problem”
Inflation is “transitory”
Inflation is good!
The “good” news in all this is that we’re only 11 months into the Brandon administration and, as Hillary says, Americans just haven’t come to fully appreciate this administration’s “accomplishments”!
A sobering thought indeed.
“If you adjust for rising prices, inflation is pretty much under control . . . is good!”
And: It’s your own fault for wanting stuff. Do you really need a Christmas ham? Gasoline? Heat during the winter?
No demand means prices drop. Surely there’s a cave somewhere you can occupy.
Or: Whichever of the lies will convince you to swallow poison.
Odds are The Unvaccinated will join their Unvaccinated brothers and sisters in their final resting places. Peace Be Unto You…..Rest In Peace.
A trio of conservative radio hosts died of Covid. Will their deaths change vaccine resistance?
“There’s no question … when you read he [Phil Valentine] has it and then three weeks later he’s dead, it will get your attention,” a conservative host said.
Each had publicly either mocked vaccination or derided broader vaccination efforts.
Bernier, who called himself “Mr. Anti-Vax,” said on Twitter that the Biden administration’s push for vaccine intake was Nazi-esque.
Farrel posted to Facebook in July: “why take a vax promoted by people who lied 2u all along about masks, where the virus came from and the death toll?” And Valentine questioned why he should get the shots and risk side effects when he was at low risk of death.
Before they died, Farrel and Valentine changed their postures.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/trio-conservative-radio-hosts-died-covid-will-their-deaths-change-n1278258
“Unvaccinated”. Every time I hear one of you cowering frightened lemmings mocking the “unvaccinated” and cheerily predicting their deaths I wonder just how low your parties going to go now, that is has temporarily taken power. Because this is low. This is the lowest of the low. But then again what can you expect from a group of paranoid frightened lemmings who want everyone to crawl under a rock and hide like them from the big bad “virus” song and dance show.
Funny how all us “unvaccinated’ are doing fine, especially here in rural Virginia where none of us ever wore masks, or walked around like a neurotic sanitizing our hands, etc. We ignored it. And it didn’t bother us. I still walk into the stores, talk to the senior citizen cashiers who chuckle when you ask if they’re worried about it. No one’s afraid, and no ones dying. Almost 2 years later none of us have had any issue, whatsoever. Yet you paranoid stooges still pop your heads up from behind your masks and sanitized “safe spaces” to tell us all how stupid we are and how we’re all gonna die and you’re gonna dance on our graves.
I’m in my 60s. I’m supposed to be afraid like you. I’m not. . And no matter how much it disturbs your demons, I’m not going to be, no matter how much chicken littles like you squawk.
The sky may be falling, but it only seems to be landing on your heads.
To have anyone who supports Trump fully, call anyone racist is the height of ignorance. And now they call for law and order, again they show that hypocrisy has no bounds.
If looters would kill you to get to your property, then you should
be able to kill them to protect it.
Retail Theft Laws Have Been Lax Longer Than The Public Knows
Even in the 1980’s, Retail Theft laws in many cities were so lax that First-Time Offenders faced nothing more than misdemeanor court supervision. But smart phones now enable mob coordination. And the pandemic brought about staffing shortages at many retailers that are still an issue.
Conservatives should bear in mind that January 6th did NOTHING for the cause of law enforcement. In fact, it’s insulting when defenders and enablers of January 6th pretend to ‘support’ police with regards to this epidemic of theft. Their actions have undermined police as much as the policies of leftists.
Psaki regularly takes Doocy to the woodshed. It’s beautiful to watch.
I respectfully disagree. She speaks for an organization that can’t seem to connect the dots – or prefers not to make those connections.
Bahahahahahha….you are joking, right?? If not, you need to take your head out of the sand and stop listening to CNN and MSNBC lie to you. What a joke.
Doocy is a clown. He gets regularly owned by Jen Psaki.
regularly owned by Jen Psaki.
Non specific smears. Nothing to debate. Name one. lets get the details and seek the truth.
Owned. She makes him squeal. Every time.
youtube any Psaki/Doocy exchange. The proof is everywhere.
That’s why specifics are required
Really? Might one really defend the indefensible?
_______________________________________________________
“The lady doth protest too much, methinks”
– Queen Gertrude, Hamlet
_____________________
Doocy is like the turquoise Psaki wears, he brings out the “red” in her.
Aha. I’m not the only Psaki fan here.
If Martin was alive today would he condemn the looting? Where is the Black leadership today? Bereft of hero’s. There are some such as Glenn Loury, John Mcwhorter, and Thomas Sowell who stand against the lunacy but they are marginalized and their voices are muted by those on the left. Why shouldn’t they loot when they are told they can everything for free by the tribe leader Biden. I wouldn’t be surprised to find that Psaki purchased one of those diamond studded purses on EBay.
Think this through: Top law enforcement officials say the biggest domestic terror threat comes from white supremacists.
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas told senators on Wednesday that the greatest domestic threat facing the United States came from what they both called “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists.”
“Specifically those who advocate for the superiority of the white race,” Mr. Garland told the Senate Appropriations Committee.
The cabinet secretaries’ comments reflected a dramatic shift in tone from the Trump administration, which deliberately downplayed the threat from white supremacists and similar groups, in part to elevate the profile of what former President Donald J. Trump described as violent threats from radical left-wing groups.
Last year, a former head of the Department of Homeland Security’s intelligence branch filed a whistle-blower complaint in which he accused the department of blocking a report about the threat of violent extremism and described white supremacists as having been “exceptionally lethal in their abhorrent targeted attacks in recent years.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/12/us/politics/domestic-terror-white-supremacists.html
“Attorney General Merrick B. Garland . . .”
Then, of course, there are the ongoing BLM/Antifa riots, the gangland shoplifting sprees, the senseless assaults, arson, and skyrocketing murders — on full display for all to witness.
So who are you going to believe: Garland or your own lying eyes?
The politicians on the left are playing down the crime wave because they are very afraid of losing their constituency. Everyone wants to walk on eggshells when describing the looters but we know who they predominantly are. The politicians on the left will allow any behavior because their plan to keep the voters of color in their camp is failing so rest assured that they are paying attention. Trump gained voters in the Black an Hispanic communities and the Democrats are in a panic. It won’t take much more of a shift in the votes of people of color to put the Democrats out of power so they will not condemn even the worst actions by those who might vote for them. The law abiding citizen be damned.
I oppose the criminal elements who are committing these shoplifting crimes. I oppose allowing persons who are charged with an act of violence freed on little or no bail.
I’m more concerned about a nation full of white male school shooters than a diverse set of California shoplifters.
I support investigating all white males of every age who are registered gun owners who share a household with a white male student from age 12-21 yrs. of age.
All white male students from 12-21 yrs. of age constitute a suspect class based on the fact the majority of school shooters were disturbed, agitated white males who accessed a gun from their houshold.
These investigations should include free gun locks for gun owners and free mental health counseling for “disturbed, agitated white males.”
The gun owner who shares a household with a white male student should sign a “Community Oath To Protect Others” promising in writing to keep your gun locked and secured from anyone except yourself.
I prefer gun owner participation in The Community’s Gun Safety Program than to confiscate all guns.
After interviewing shooters, family members, survivors, friends, etc. we found the pathway to school violence is repeated over and over and over: the circumstances of the Oxford shooting are repeated again and again and again: A white male school student with a trauma history leaking their plans to shoot up the school, telling people in charge they are suicidal, taking guns from their parents, shooting and killing people.
Over 80% of mass shooters were in a noticeable crisis prior to their shooting.
It’s the same thing over and over again.
Jillian Peterson, clinical psychologist and co-founder of The Violence Project who wrote a book on how to stop school shootings: The Violence Project: “How to Stop a Mass Shooting Epidemic”
I support installing metal detectors in all schools. I support the Second Amendment and the right of a person to own and posses a gun to protect your home.
I oppose conceal and carry and the public display of firearms. I support grabbing all guns that are not registered and are not at the gun owner’s dwelling place.
The oft-repeated complaint that one must have a concealed or unconcealed weapon to protect oneself in public does not outweigh the public interest in removing all guns from public places, including removing guns from criminals in public places. Police Chiefs nationwide support keeping all guns off the streets if they had a choice, because they know that less guns means less violence.
https://www.theviolenceproject.org/
Your comment was racist against whites…and it was selective about statistics.
Black men commit a disproportionate amount of violent and non violent crime. It would be racist to view black men with mistrust as statistically more likely to be violent than, say, an Asian man.
Less guns means less violence? Perhaps you should skim through a history book covering eras prior to the invention of gunpowder. Or read the news about skyrocketing crime in nations without gun rights.
There’s nothing more frightening in America today than an angry White man who believes his White Privilige is being revoked, except for a racist white woman.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/20/us/angry-white-men-trials-blake-cec/index.html
That what they sad about Jew privilege, Tutsi privilege, Zulu privilege, etc. Same religion, same ideology, same wicked solutions. Diversity [dogma] (i.e. color judgment) breeds adversity.
So angry white males are the ones doing drive-bys in the ‘hood?
That’s really racist and misogynist, Ron.
“That’s really racist and misogynist, Ron.”
– Karen S
________
Racism and misogyny are opinion, a freedom enjoyed by Americans, understanding that property damage and bodily injury are immoral and illegal by statute, and that violence is falsely and insidiously conflated with opinions on racism and misogyny for inflammatory purposes. Every race is racist.
Freedom of assembly means that its inverse, segregation, is similarly a freedom enjoyed by Americans.
Freedom of speech, thought and assembly means that others do not need to agree or approve.
To deny freedom of speech, thought and assembly is to deny the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Are you a Constitution denier?
very good George….yes (stroking beard) ….Jefferson said the answer to free speech you don’t like, is not to stifle – but to respond in kind. Censorship and personal attacks are unecessary…unless you’re a stinkin’ MAGA-brain…..hahahha…..but that’s my point, we’re all going to be offended sooner or later……..don’t hate, try to relate…..easier said than done….
White male supremacy in America is a deeply entrenched promise that any white man can grab onto, no matter his bank account, social station, or dental situation; it is essentially a literal get-out-of-jail-free card and what Oluo terms “America’s oldest pyramid scheme.”
“A lot of times people will ask, why do poor white people vote against their interests?,” Oluo, queries, “And I hate it when people assume that [that’s what they’re doing] because it depends on what interests. The ability to go home and look in the mirror and say, ‘At least I’m not Black,’ is an interest. And it’s a strong one.”
Race Writer, Ijeoma Oluo Knows the Danger of Mediocre White Men
The entire American welfare state is unconstitutional.
All men were created equal; after creation success is created by each man.
The unconstitutional crutches of dependents and parasites are matriculation affirmative action, grade-inflation affirmative action, employment affirmative action, quotas, welfare, food stamps, minimum wage, rent control, social services, forced busing, public housing, utility subsidies, WIC, SNAP, TANF, HAMP, HARP, TARP, HHS, HUD, Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Labor, Energy, Obamacare, Social Security, Social Security Disability, Social Security Supplemental Income, Medicare, Medicaid, “Fair Housing” laws, “Non-Discrimination” laws, etc.
You don’t criticize Africa for its black male supremacy, you must not be allowed to criticize America for the success of its freedom and free enterprise, you must not be allowed to criticize those who earned it.
Funfact: The Israelite slaves were out of Egypt before the ink was dry on their release papers – but then they possessed the capacity and acumen sufficient to the task; they didn’t ask, they did.
People must adapt to freedom.
Freedom does not adapt to people; dictatorship does.
..you dropped your White Pointy Sheets and your Zoloft, bro.
Karen,
Please do not feed the Trolls….just ignore their posts as best you can.
Ronald is exactly one that should be on a starvation diet in that regard.
Karen your just feeding the troll. Nothing he posted is anything but attention seeking.
You’re right, of course, Iowan and Ralph. It proved irresistible to me to point out the racism inherent in the Left’s bigotry. They do not want to be held to their own standards.
Karen S.
It appears the Left has moved the goalposts of what white supremacy is in America.
I was in the truck (I am sure that makes me a white supremacist according to them, even though I am not white) listening to one of the public radio programs.
According to them, if you go to church and are white, you are a white supremacist.
Gun owner and white? White supremacist.
Want to have visibility/say of what is being taught in your child’s school? White supremacist.
Home school? White supremacist.
Believe in grades, standards, meritocracy? White supremacist.
Personal responsibility? White supremacist.
Individualism? White supremacist.
Free speech? White supremacist.
They listed another half dozen or so of so-called white supremacist traits.
And they claim it is a growing problem in America.
Upstate Farmer:
The Left reminds me of the SNL church lady who saw Satan everywhere.
The Left pretends to see white supremacy everywhere, in order to escape debating facts, and policy consequences. For instance, they can have no logical response to complaints that defunding the police led to more crime, including murder, so they declare them white supremacists. Get people on the defensive, denying they are racist, and they’ve succeeded in changing the subject.
I recall once seeing a Pyramid of White Supremacy, which considered punctuality, color blindness, and personal responsibility to be aspects of white supremacy. There is no reasoning with the irrational.
Karen S.
Well said.
Irrational, hyper emotional, are common traits of the Left.
Note, I did not say liberals. Actual liberals (e.g. Bill Maher) thinks the Left is nuts.
ron…:
“I’m more concerned about a nation full of white male school shooters than a diverse set of California shoplifters.
I support investigating all white males of every age who are registered gun owners who share a household with a white male student from age 12-21 yrs. of age.”
********************************************
Of course you do. it fits your race-based view of the world. White – bad; Diverse-Good. I’d suggest you don’t come around my house investigating me. It’s unhealthy.
Ron: “Over 80% of mass shooters were in a noticeable crisis prior to their shooting.”
++++
Yes, they were noticed by staff and often by psychiatrists and psychologists who did nothing.
Frequently it has been learned after the fact that many of these people were also on SSRIs for depression. A known side effect of these drugs is an increased rate of suicide. It isn’t difficult to imagine a resentful teenager who is suicidal deciding to take out others who have upset him.
Before the appearance of these drugs school shootings were practically unknown.
You focused on white youths killing which certainly get a lot of media attention but are relatively rare. The real slaughter–and it is daily, almost hourly–is in black neighborhoods and done by young black men. They use guns, they use knives, they use feet and fists and clubs, and they use vehicles. But you aren’t interested in that, are you?
https://www.city-journal.org/media-silence-on-black-on-black-violence
Top law enforcement officials say the biggest domestic terror threat comes from white supremacists.
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas told senators on Wednesday that the greatest domestic threat facing the United States came from what they both called “racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists.”
“Specifically those who advocate for the superiority of the white race,” Mr. Garland told the Senate Appropriations Committee.
The cabinet secretaries’ comments reflected a dramatic shift in tone from the Trump administration, which deliberately downplayed the threat from white supremacists and similar groups, in part to elevate the profile of what former President Donald J. Trump described as violent threats from radical left-wing groups.
Last year, a former head of the Department of Homeland Security’s intelligence branch filed a whistle-blower complaint in which he accused the department of blocking a report about the threat of violent extremism and described white supremacists as having been “exceptionally lethal in their abhorrent targeted attacks in recent years.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/12/us/politics/domestic-terror-white-supremacists.html
NYT and Mr. Garland for sources. You might as well suck on a sewer pipe. Nothing from either of them is reliable or clean.
“[T]he biggest domestic terror threat comes from white supremacists.”
Really? And which specific criminal acts are those?
What I own is none of your, or anyone else’s business, particularly government; nor is where I carry it or in what manner, openly, concealed, or otherwise.
so if the government comes to your house to grab your guns, are you going to have a shoot out with the police?
“Between 1982 and November 2021, 66 out of the 125 mass shootings in the United States were carried out by white shooters. By comparison, the perpetrator was African American in 21 mass shootings, and Latino in 10. When calculated as percentages, this amounts to 53 percent, 17 percent, and eight percent respectively.
“Broadly speaking, the racial distribution of mass shootings mirrors the racial distribution of the U.S. population as a whole. While a superficial comparison of the statistics seems to suggest African American shooters are over-represented and Latino shooters underrepresented…”
https://www.statista.com/statistics/476456/mass-shootings-in-the-us-by-shooter-s-race/
People of black are over represented in mass crimes, especially targeting other people of black.
excellent (and succinct/effective) response.
(my comment is addressed to “Isaiah.”
Less guns means more violence and more weapons.
What happened at that school happens in Chicago every weekend. It doesn’t seem to bother anyone. But that’s OK, its blacks killing blacks.