Here in Charlotte, NC, the local fishwrap (Charlotte Observer, which I refer to as the Disturber) continually flogs the issue of HB2 and the damage it’s causing to the economy here. Their latest editorial diatribe appears today under the breathless headline: “A year later, HB2 has cost North Carolina millions. How much worse will it get?”.
Yet there is no proof of any damage to the economy at all.
If you follow their logic, it has “cost” the State millions because NC hasn’t legalized marijuana, prostitution, gambling, and a host of other things the majority of the State’s largely-moral population is against.
In one instance they claimed that Company XYZ abandoned a construction project (or possibly renting office space) at the very last minute because of some newfound moral outrage about HB2.
This would ignore the very long, very expensive runup to such a build or expansion. To walk away dramatically in some sort of boycott would be financially ruinous and therefore highly unlikely. There was no official statement from the company and no proof for the claim other than what might charitably be called anecdotal evidence.
The loss of virtue-signaling sports leagues and games is a plus, not a minus, in almost every conceivable category except, perhaps, if you are a popcorn vendor.
Ironically, the same people who tsk-tsk about the outsized importance of sports in the culture are the ones claiming the loss of a once-per-year event (ACC) or a once-per-20-years event (NBA All-Star Game) are bellwethers of economic ruin and that losing them shames NC.
Hypocrisy is nothing new for the lefties, nor is failing to connect cause and effect. It can't be said often enough: had the smug city council not overstepped the mark then HB2 never would have been enacted.
My grandmother was from NC (many visits as a kid). How in heck does that rag even get published in NC?