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Is San Francisco the Future of America?
Townhall.com ^ | October 16, 2016 | Lee Edwards

Posted on 10/16/2019 5:12:12 PM PDT by Kaslin

It’s one thing to read about the decline of San Francisco. It’s another to see it for yourself.

I could hardly recognize this once-captivating city of breathtaking views, delectable food and cool jazz. Today it’s occupied by an army of homeless men and women who have turned Baghdad-by-the-bay into Bombay-by-the-bay with some of the dirtiest slums in America.

I first visited San Francisco in 1964 as a member of Barry Goldwater’s political team that wrapped up the Republican presidential nomination for the candidate who offered a conservative choice, not a liberal echo.

Then, we freely roamed the streets and hills of the city. Today, you watch your step lest you slip on human feces. Then, Goldwater Girls in their white cowboy hats and boots welcomed delegates and guests at the Cow Palace. Today, homeless men openly urinate in Union Square.

Then, we shared copies of “The Conscience of a Conservative.” Now, the homeless share their needles. Then, we opposed the legalization of marijuana. Now, Californians seem to grow more weed than oranges.

What has happened? Why is America slouching like some rough beast — not toward Bethlehem, but Gomorrah? Beyond dispute, things feel as if they are failing apart, and the common rules of a civil society no longer seem to apply.

Then, most Americans agreed that the family is the basic bloc of society. Now, according to the rising generation, the nuclear family is disappearing, gay rights take precedence over every other kind of right, Washington is accepted as primarily responsible for our welfare, and socialism is the tidal wave of the future.

What has happened? A major reason is the influence, in and out of the academy, of political philosophers such as John Rawls, who argues that everything is relative and there is no absolute right or wrong. Rawls is the liberals’ favorite philosopher because he believes, as politics professor Jerome Foss puts it, that “the purpose of government is to rectify every injustice.” Not the Founders, who instituted a system of checks and balances to limit the role of government.

The government that Rawls envisions, says Foss, “is empowered to enforce a theory without any institutional restraints.” So much for the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and their reliance on certain “self-evident” truths, accumulated through 2,500 years of Western civilization from Jerusalem to Athens to Rome to London to Philadelphia.

I was a stranger in a strange land in San Francisco as I watched the people tread the sidewalks carefully on the way to work and shrug in embarrassment about the feces and the needles and the homeless tents that sprout like weeds. I reflected on what the plain-speaking Barry Goldwater might say about the tragic decline of this once magical city, and I believe it would be something like: “Let’s cut out the crap and clean it up!” And then he would quote Milton Friedman on the importance of freedom — and, equally, the importance of what you do with that freedom.

I might have gone home depressed and saddened by what I had seen, but my next stop was Dallas. After a day among its shining skyscrapers, clean streets and parks, and optimistic can-do residents, my spirits soared. All was not lost.

The young professionals whom I met were excited about what tomorrow might bring. Dallas, not San Francisco, is the future, unless the citizens of Baghdad-by-the-bay resolve to take back their city.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; US: California
KEYWORDS: california; disease; drugs; fatherlessness; feminism; homelessness; promiscuity
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1 posted on 10/16/2019 5:12:12 PM PDT by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin

It’s the Democrats vision of the future.


2 posted on 10/16/2019 5:13:23 PM PDT by BipolarBob (Bipolars have more fun. No we don't.)
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To: Kaslin

If libtard socialism gets its way.


3 posted on 10/16/2019 5:15:47 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; Not Averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: Kaslin

Overrun by Indians, Chinese, liberals, communists, socialists, illegals and homeless


4 posted on 10/16/2019 5:16:44 PM PDT by Starcitizen (American. No hypenation necessary. Send the H1B and H4EAD slime home. American jobs for Americans)
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To: Secret Agent Man

This is the product of of and the future of socialism.


5 posted on 10/16/2019 5:17:08 PM PDT by oldenuff35
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To: Kaslin

America is becoming more like San Francisco, than San Francisco is becoming like America.


6 posted on 10/16/2019 5:17:10 PM PDT by Meatspace
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To: oldenuff35

Their slogan: Aim Low.


7 posted on 10/16/2019 5:18:00 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; Not Averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: Kaslin
"A major reason is the influence, in and out of the academy, of political philosophers such as John Rawls, who argues that everything is relative and there is no absolute right or wrong." We are here: “If there are no absolutes by which to judge society, then society is absolute.” Francis Schaeffer, How Shall We Then Live? (Old Tappan NJ: Fleming H Revell Company, 1976), p. 224.
8 posted on 10/16/2019 5:18:26 PM PDT by Fungi
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To: Kaslin

If the democrats have their way with us. Listened to the debate last night. They all have big plans for us.


9 posted on 10/16/2019 5:20:38 PM PDT by Jim Robinson (Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God!)
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To: BipolarBob

It’s the Democrats version of the present.


10 posted on 10/16/2019 5:21:54 PM PDT by fhayek
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To: Fungi

This was posted on another thread and nails it.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=61BhYPdIlao


11 posted on 10/16/2019 5:22:25 PM PDT by RushIsMyTeddyBear (:¬| Beep beep)
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To: Kaslin

I think its clear to anyone not deep indenial that Frisco is the result of 55-60 years of liberal ‘planning’ and control.

You can see it occurring in every major metro area liberals have run for long, lomg times. Detriot, Dearborn, Chicago, every major libtard run area are in the same kinds of decline and crime issues, illegal aliens issues, pc bs issues, denial of ineptness by libtards regarding their proven failure ‘strategies’ that I believe many implement to bring about decay and decline. On purpose.


12 posted on 10/16/2019 5:22:38 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; Not Averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: Kaslin
I liked SF (except for the restaurant in Chinatown that turned out to be dirty) when I was there in 1981 (rode the cable cars and the Muni bus but I regret not riding BART). I stayed at the Sheraton Fishermans Wharf which is still there per Google Sat.

God have mercy on all of Cali. JimRob, I envy you not.

ff

13 posted on 10/16/2019 5:23:39 PM PDT by foreverfree
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To: Kaslin

Take a look at Honolulu for another example of a third-world sh!th*le. More homeless per capita than SF. Everything falling apart, taxes going through the roof.


14 posted on 10/16/2019 5:24:02 PM PDT by kaehurowing
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To: Kaslin

Why do we still need the Constitution now that we have algorithms?


15 posted on 10/16/2019 5:25:15 PM PDT by Montaignes Cat
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To: Kaslin

San Francisco looked pretty slummy in the dressed-up horse operas that made Clint Eastwood a major star.


16 posted on 10/16/2019 5:30:15 PM PDT by Zhang Fei (My dad had a Delta 88. That was a car. It was like driving your living room.)
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To: Kaslin

By my calculation from Nob Hill to the bay, it is down hill.

Yes, San Francisco is the new prototype for urban America under the rule of millennial donkeys.

Suck it up buttercup.


17 posted on 10/16/2019 5:34:00 PM PDT by ptsal
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To: Zhang Fei

QM made some parts look ok.


18 posted on 10/16/2019 5:35:25 PM PDT by wally_bert (Hola. Me llamo Inspector Carlton Lassiter. Me gusta queso.)
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To: Zhang Fei

QM made some parts look ok.


19 posted on 10/16/2019 5:35:29 PM PDT by wally_bert (Hola. Me llamo Inspector Carlton Lassiter. Me gusta queso.)
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To: ptsal

The crabs will flourish and the mussels will multiply.

Of course, eating them will make you sick.

Again, suck it up buttercup.


20 posted on 10/16/2019 5:35:33 PM PDT by ptsal
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