By William Haupt III | The Center Square contributor
A man stands next to tents on a sidewalk in San
Francisco, Tuesday, April 21, 2020. - Jeff Chiu / AP
“Nancy Pelosi’s district in California has rapidly become
one of the worst anywhere in the U.S. when it comes to the homeless and crime.
It has gotten so bad, so fast.” – Donald Trump
In the 1960s, America's boomers rebelled against
authority and the Vietnam War. They pursued sexual liberation, experimental
drugs, communal living and civil rights. This counterculture lived by the motto
"sex, drugs, rock and roll." In 1967, thousands of hippies and flower
children made their way to Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco for what was billed
as the “Summer of Love” – and many never left. Haight-Ashbury soon eroded into
an enclave for drop outs, addicts and the homeless.
In the late 1970s, the area was targeted for
gentrification and investors began cleaning it up. By 1990, Haight-Ashbury was
among San Francisco’s most affluent and expensive neighborhoods.
But today it is home to tent cities with trash-ridden
streets, ravaged with violent crime, and it is a Mecca for drug users and
sellers. Conditions are worse than slums in most every other U.S. city.
How can the most expensive place to live in America, also
be one of the worst places to live in the U.S.A.? While San Francisco has been
the most progressive city in America for years, this liberal utopia has not
always been a harbor for addicts, the homeless, criminals and social derelicts.
“It's an odd thing, but anyone who disappears is said to
be seen in San Francisco." – Oscar Wilde
In the 1960s, liberal strategist Phillip Burton saw the
potential of growing the Democratic Party by pandering to the hippies,
minorities and gays. With their support, he was elected to the U.S. House in
1964, where he served until his death in 1983. His wife Sala Burton held this
seat until 1987. In a special election, Nancy Pelosi seized this coveted progressive
prize in 1987 and won't give it up.
With the election of far left liberal Gov. Jerry Brown in
2010, San Francisco became a progressive paradise. In 2014, Brown financed Prop
57, which helped free thousands of California inmates from prison. Voters also
approved Prop 47, which reduced most nonviolent crimes including theft under
$950 to misdemeanors. Both were pushed by Lt Governor Gavin Newsom, San
Francisco district attorney George Gascón, the San Francisco Democratic Party,
and the Harvey Milk LGBT Club.
In 2016, voters approved Prop 64, giving municipalities
the power to ban or sell weed. But many cities and counties did not react. A
2011 federal court had ruled that local governments trying to regulate the sale
of weed would violate federal law. But it was welcomed by all San Franciscans.
By 2019, the deregulation of crime, release of thousands
of inmates, legalization of cannabis, and declaring California a sanctuary
state enabled new Gov Gavin Newsom, the former mayor of San Francisco, to clone
the entire state of California into a progressive twin sister of San Francisco.
San Francisco has declared the NRA a “domestic terrorist
organization,” banned fast-food joints that include toys in children’s meals,
outlawed plastic bags and straws, raised the minimum wage from $9.79 to $15.59
an hour and refuses to prosecute anyone for nonviolent crimes. While these
policies appeal to the far left, they also encourage the homeless and derelicts
to venture up north.
How bad are things in San Francisco? According to a KGO
news report, in 2011 the Bay City spent $157 million on the homeless. By 2016,
it was up to $242 million. In the 2021 budget proposal, it is now over $364
million. The consensus estimates the homeless population is at least 17,500.
"As mayor of San Francisco, I witnessed its greatest
cultural and social transition." – Gavin Newsom
Progressives insist the stark contrast in wealth and
poverty is the result of the failure of capitalism to provide for the needy.
But while politicians preach “compassion,” their policies have resulted in
record-high levels of homelessness, drug addiction, and a rapid increase in
violent felonious crime.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the city’s
policies have created an “influx of about 450 homeless people a year who
migrate to places like the Tenderloin District. This is a sanctuary for people
hiding out from the law who do not want the government to know where they are
living.
In reaction to the George Floyd and Black Lives Matter
protests and riots, along with outrage by activists against police, San
Francisco elected progressive Chesa Boudin as district attorney of San
Francisco in 2020. He was endorsed by Angela Davis, Bernie Sanders and Ibram X.
Kendi.
Boudin, the adopted son of radicals Bill Ayers and Bernardine
Dohrn, quickly reduced the use of cash bail and restrained the power of police.
He quit prosecuting misdemeanors. He then did the unthinkable and started
charging police officers with felonies who used force during arrests.
“I will move away from the draconian, tough-on-crime,
three-strike super-rhetoric hype." – Chesa Boudin
According to Stop Crime, the Bay City is experiencing a
dramatic increase in serious crime under Boudin. Burglaries are up 42% and
homicides have increased 30% compared to the previous year.
Motor vehicle thefts have risen by 71% and arsons have
jumped over 35% since he became DA.
Recently, a local ABC News reporter witnessed a
shoplifter sweeping entire shelves of products into garbage bags inside a
Walgreens. He mounted a bike, and rode past a security guard out the door.
Other retail stores are reporting the same problems in every neighborhood in
San Francisco.
"This rise in crime is a result of Chesa Boudin's
soft-crime policies." – Frank Noto, Victim’s Rights
It's been said that, "The road to hell is paved with
good intentions." All good intentions of Prop 47 and Prop 57 have been
undone by Chesa Boudin's leftist extremism, pandering to criminals and
punishing the police for doing their job. What’s happening in San Francisco is
proof how quickly perjured progressive idealism can turn an economically
prosperous city into a living hell on earth.
It is hard to fathom, when Nancy Pelosi returns to her
district and sees the homeless tents, violent crime, and drug addicts, she can
turn a blind eye to this social and economic carnage. And it’s the epitome of
all insults that she is trying to clone America into San Francisco!
“Public sentiment is very clear; we need to reign in the
abuse of power by police to obtain social justice.” – Nancy Pelosi
In 1963, Tony Bennett won a Grammy Award for his song,
"I Left My Heart in San Francisco.” He crooned; “I’ve been terribly alone
and forgotten in Manhattan. I’m going home to my City by the Bay.” Progressives
destroyed Tony Bennett's storybook San Francisco one bad law at a time. He is
now retired in Queens, NY. At 95, he'd never recognize the city that he once
immortalized.
"No one can really understand the political left
without understanding that they are about making themselves feel superior,
however much they talk piously about helping others." – Thomas Sowell
______________
RELATED
ARTICLE
Leftism Is Destroying San Francisco, AP
Concedes
BY MATT MARGOLIS | P J MEDIA
(AP Photo/Eric Risberg, File)
San Francisco was once a world-class city but has over
many decades become a bastion of crime and a literal toilet. Conservatives have pointed out how San
Francisco’s notoriously left-wing culture has destroyed the city, and now the
Associated Press has finally caught on.
“Caitlin Foster fell in love with San Francisco’s people
and beauty and moved to the city a dozen years ago,” the AP reported on Saturday. “But after repeatedly clearing
away used needles, other drug paraphernalia and human feces outside the bar she
manages, and too many encounters with armed people in crisis, her affection for
the city has soured.”
“It was a goal to live here, but now I’m here and I’m
like, ‘Where am I going to move to now?’ I’m over it,'” she said.
The woke city also no longer prosecutes shoplifting,
which, of course, resulted in a shoplifting epidemic. According to the
AP, San Franciscans not only “take pride in their liberal political bent,” but
they also “accept that trashy streets, tent encampments and petty crime are the
price to pay to live in an urban wonderland.”
But even liberals have their breaking point when it comes
to getting what they vote for. Residents are starting to wake up to the fact
their city is in decline and are reportedly “losing patience.”
The
pandemic emptied parts of San Francisco and highlighted some of its drawbacks:
human and dog feces smeared across sidewalks, home and vehicle break-ins,
overflowing trash cans, and a laissez-faire approach by officials to brazen
drug dealing. Parents despaired as public schools stayed closed for most of
last year as nearby districts welcomed children back to the classroom.
Meanwhile,
residents and visitors scurry past scenes of lawlessness and squalor. Just
steps from the Opera House and Symphony Hall, drug dealers carry translucent
bags filled with crystal-like rocks or stand outside the public library’s main
branch, flashing wads of cash while peddling heroin and methamphetamine.
It’s a tragic thing to read the tales of residents who
are disgusted by their city’s crime, drug use, and dirtiness.
The drug problem in San Francisco is so bad that last
year 712 people died of drug overdoses, compared to 257 people who died of
COVID-19.
One resident laments, realizing too late that Democratic
activists have hijacked the city, “If I say I want laws enforced, I’m racist.
I’m like, ‘No, I’m not racist. There’s a reason I live in San Francisco.'”
The bigger question is, have the residents who have fled
San Francisco learned from their experience watching their beloved liberal
utopia deteriorate before their eyes, or will they continue to support
Democrats who support the same policies that destroyed the city they loved?
